The Week Ahead: Emeralds, black tie, milk, cake and allergy medicine on the slate
Emeralds, black tie, milk, cake and allergy medicine may sound like an odd mix, but that’s exactly what’s on the slate for investors this morning.
The hayfever medicine maker Allergy Therapeutics delivers finals, along with the white label cake maker Finsbury Foods and precious stone specialist Gemfields. Dairy Crest will meanwhile publish a trading update, while first-half figures are due from the wedding suit hire outlet Moss Bros. Outside of corporate news, existing home sales data will be released.
AG Barr, the Irn Bru and Rubicon drinks group, brings us six-monthly performance figures tomorrow, perhaps pleased that Scotland, its homeland, has voted to stay in the Union. Numis’s Charles Pick expects pre-tax profit to inch ahead to £17.8m, from £16.6m in the period last year, while Mr Pick is also optimistic about future prospects thanks to the current squeeze on sugar prices.
The financial services group Close Brothers has full-year figures, as does Regenersis, which specialises in repairing consumer tech like HTC phones and TomToms. PZ Cussons, the consumer goods giant that owns everything from Original Source shower gel to St Tropez self-tan, is due to publish first-half numbers. The ONS will also release public-sector borrowing figures for August.
The online gaming group 32Red has interim figures mid-week, with Numis’s Ivor Jones predicting steady earnings at £2.5m. Mr Jones believes the company is “well-placed to deliver robust growth in the balance of 2014”. The pharmaceuticals group Clingen is scheduled to put out finals, while the Irish agribusiness Origin Enterprises has preliminary figures.
Sheridan Admans at the Shares Centre advises investors to look out for an update from United Utilities on its view of recent draft price proposals from the regulator, Ofwat, when the water supplier updates on trading Wednesday.
Thursday heralds no significant company updates but in economic news, the CBI delivers figures from its retail sales survey for September and house price inflation stats will be put out by Nationwide. On Friday, housing survey data is due from Hometrack.
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