Music firm stake strikes right note for ex-BBC boss
SHARES in digital media company
One Media iP rocketed nearly 53pc after ex-Pinewood bosses Lord Grade and Ivan Dunleavy snapped up a stake in the firm.
Lord Grade, 74, who previously served as chairman of the BBC and ITV, has reunited with Dunleavy to take a 17.4pc stake.
The pair ran Pinewood Studios together before selling the company for £323m to Aermont Capital last year. Together they have invested £375,000 in the Londonlisted firm and will become nonexecutive directors.
News of their involvement sent One Media up 52.9pc, or 2.25p, to 6.5p. One Media was set up 12 years ago and sells music rights to streaming giants like Spotify, iTunes and You Tube.
The company, which is based at Pinewood, has a catalogue of more than 250,000 tracks. It focuses on selling nostalgic songs by artists such as Ricky Valance, Evelyn Thomas, Anita Harris, The Tremeloes, the Troggs and Marv Johnson.
Chief executive Michael Infante said that by focusing on classics the firm is less exposed to the risks faced by record labels which mainly cater to new artists, as they only purchase the rights to songs they know are sure-fire hits.
He added that Grade and Dunleavy will provide a wealth of experience as the firm seeks to capitalise on the streaming market which is set to be worth £21bn by 2030.
The FTSE 250 finished up 1pc, or 206.8 points, to 20,255.4 points, while the FTSE 100 finished up 0.6pc, or 46.4 points 7,537 points.
Research by investment platform AJ Bell found the FTSE 100 could break the 8,000 mark for the first time in 2018.
Engineering firm Babcock soared higher after revealing it had been awarded a ten-year contract to supply the Sellafield nuclear site with specialist handling and containment systems.
Through the deal struck by subsidiary Cavendish Nuclear, it will design, manufacture and supply equipment for the treatment and management of nuclear materials. It finished up 3.2pc or 22p to 706.5p.
Also up was Mondi which jumped on rumours investors are in line for a £660m Christmas present. Analysts at Deutsche Bank upgraded the firm from ‘hold’ to ‘buy’ claiming it reckons a £660m special dividend is on the way, on top of the £264m normal dividend.
DB said it expects Mondi’s earnings to approach €1.5bn next year and, because larger acquisitions are too expensive for Mondi at this stage, a special dividend is more likely. The news buoyed investors and sent shares up 2.2pc, or 39p, to 1857p.
Energy services group Hunting was the FTSE 250’s biggest riser, leaping 6.3pc, or 34.5p, to 586p, after it revealed sales were likely to be at the upper end of expectations – coming it at around the £522m mark. But podcast platform Audioboom plunged after it said it expects to post a £4.5m loss for the full-year. The loss was slightly narrower than the £4.6m loss posted a year prior and came despite a 250pc boost in sales to £4.8m from £1.3m.
Monthly users jumped to 89.1m from 58.6m the year before while advertising impressions expanded to 2.1bn from 242m. In order to maximise its advertising revenue, Audioboom embeds its adverts into clips so that they cannot easily be blocked by an Adblocker.
Rob Proctor, chief executive, said the firm is ‘ready to benefit from the tremendous increases in audience and content’ adding that it ‘is now in the strongest possible position to maximise the foundations we have built over the last three years’.
But shareholders weren’t convinced and its shares plunged 15.8pc, or 0.52p, to 2.8p.