The chair of De La Rue (DLAR) has caved to investor pressure and resigned, following yet another profit warning. Kevin Loosemore will leave office on 1 May “to draw a line under recent speculation surrounding the leadership of the company”.
Activist investor Crystal Amber renewed its efforts to oust Loosemore in March and, last week, the banknote printer issued its third profit warning in 12 months.
Crystal Amber is seeking to replace Loosemore with industrial manufacturing specialist Pepyn Dinandt. De La Rue said it will appoint a new non-executive chair on 2 May, or “as soon as practicable thereafter”. Shares in the group rose by 8 per cent following the announcement. JS
Sorrell making ‘excellent recovery’ after surgery
Sir Martin Sorrell, chair of advertising group S4 Capital (SFOR), had “successful keyhole surgery” to remove a tumour in February. The marketing veteran will receive preventative treatment in the coming months, and has decided to reduce his travel schedule for a few weeks. “Otherwise, business as usual,” he said. JS
Landsec to sell £400mn hotel portfolio, say reports
Generalist real estate investment trust (Reit) Landsec (LAND) has reportedly agreed to sell a £400mn portfolio of hotels across the UK. According to real estate news website React News, the collection of assets are being sold to a private equity player.
The news comes as many Reits are looking to offload properties at significant discounts to their values at the end of last year. The speed of this price discovery has some hoping that this commercial real estate downturn could be shorter than in 2008.
Landsec said: “We’ve said consistently since the launch of our new strategy in October 2020 that we are considering various acquisition and disposal opportunities that make financial and strategic sense to the business. Unfortunately, we’re not able to comment on individual opportunities or market speculation at this time.” ML
Read more: Spring sales arrive for commercial Reits
Momentum builds at Qinetiq
Defence technology firm QinetiQ (QQ.) expects to deliver an underlying operating profit of “at least £175mn” for its March year-end (2022: £137mn) as it maintained stable margins on double-digit revenue growth.
Recent contract wins in an “impressive” fourth quarter also meant the company’s order intake grew 40 per cent year-on-year to more than £1.7bn, while strong cash generation allowed it to bring leverage down to just 1-times earnings, a year earlier than it initially targeted.
Qinetiq shares have underperformed the wider European defence sector so far this year and trade at a 10 per cent discount to peers, Berenberg analysts said. They were up 4 per cent in early trading. MF
Read more: Past issues mask this defence stock’s potential
Renold shares jump on better-than-expected profits
Shares in Renold (RNO) jumped by 11 per cent in early trading after the company said it expects trading profit for the year to March to be “materially ahead” of already upgraded consensus forecasts.
Revenue grew by 19 per cent at constant currency rates, boosted by the recent acquisition of Spanish conveyor chain maker Industrias YUK. Like-for-like revenue was up 13 per cent.
The Manchester-based chain maker said work to recover the costs of inflation, as well as ongoing cost-cutting and efficiency programmes, had boosted margins. It also cut net debt by £4.2mn over the second half to £29.8mn at year-end. MF
