Best-ever grocery sales push FTSE to fresh high
THE FTSE 100 finished at another record high, helped by a surge in supermarket shares.
Beating the previous high of 7724.2 set on Friday, the index crept up 34.51 points, or 0.45pc, to 7731.02 after industry data from Kantar Worldpanel revealed shoppers had spent an additional £1bn in supermarkets compared to the same festive period in 2016.
The FTSE 250 finished up 0.09pc, or 18.39 points, to 20,874.95.
The upbeat data from Kantar, which also revealed that December 22 had been the busiest shopping day ever recorded, boosted grocers across the board.
Morrisons rose 2.4pc, or 5.4p, to 232.3p, Sainsbury’s jumped 3.1pc, or 7.4p, to 248.4p and Tesco increased 0.1pc, or 0.1p, to 214.4p.
Marks & Spencer finished up 2.4pc, or 7.5p, at 318.3p.
Roofing supplier SIG tumbled on revealing it would be undertaking a ‘ rigorous review’ of i ts accounts after identifying a historical overstatement of cash.
The firm’s management team discovered window dressing in the company’s previous accounting processes, which made the balance sheet look better.
It said the overstatement of cash amounted to about £20m as of December 2016 and about £27m at the end of June 2017, sending shares down 5pc, or 8.7p, to 164.5p as a result.
It came despite the Sheffieldbased company, which supplies insulation, energy management and roofing products, posting a 7.5pc rise in group sales to £2.8bn in 2017. UK sales were up 2.1pc.
The company has been battling to recover from weak trading in its UK insulation, interiors and off site construction business, and hired Meinie Oldersma as chief executive in March to help turn around its European arm.
Peel Hunt said: ‘The European businesses have performed a bit better and the UK activities a bit worse, partly because of the weather. The only disappointment is that the debt position is £20m£30m worse than expected.’ Financial services company Just
Group was the biggest casualty on the FTSE 350, after its largest shareholder – private equity firm Permira – sold £78.5m worth of shares. The sale, of 50m shares at 157p each, represents around 5.3pc of the capital.
It is understood Permira had always intended to sell-down its stake after Just Retirement and Partnership completed their £1.4bn merger in 2016.
Permira will still remain the largest investor in Just Group, holding about 17.7pc of shares. But news of the sale sent Just’s shares down 7.5pc, or 12.5p, to 155.2p. Construction services firm Caril
lion slumped after admitting it was clueless as to why its share price had surged earlier this week. The firm, which saw its shares jump more than 23pc on Monday, said it was ‘not aware of any material developments that supported the share price increase.’
Investors had hoped for a turnaround amid rumours the HS2 contractor is holding crunch talks with banks and the Government over a potential refinancing deal this week. But the pessimistic clarification sent shares tumbling 12.7pc, or 3.02p, to 20.85p.
Out- of-hospital services provider Totally soared higher after securing a contract to provide GP services to prisons in South Staff ordshire. The deal, secured through its subsidiary Vocare, which it acquired for £11m last year, is expected to generate around £3m a year.
It will initially run for 12 months, with an option to extend the contract for a further 12 months.
The announcement came as Totally revealed it had raised £18m to expand its ‘buy and build strategy’ in the UK healthcare market. The upbeat update sent shares up 10.5pc, or 4p, to 42p.