Forex group flounders on tycoon’s share pledge
On a strong day for the stock market, forex group Finablr stood out for all the wrong reasons.
It lost more than a quarter of its value after it emerged billionaire majority owner BR Shetty had pledged 392m shares, or 56pc of the company, to refinance debts related to the acquisition of Travelex in 2015.
It has been a rocky start to the year for Finablr, which was a victim of a cyber attack that forced Travelex to take its systems offline earlier this month.
The stock closed down 27.3pc, or 35.8p, to 95p. after a fairly gloomy week, the
FTSE 100 clawed back a good chunk of its losses as worries over the coronavirus and a potential UK-US trade war receded.
The mood was further lifted by a monthly survey of purchasing managers that revealed the UK has returned to growth. The index of UK blue- chip stock ended the day up 1.1pc, or 83.76 points, to 7591.43 points. The
FTSE 250 was up 1pc, or 207.73 points, to 21,748.29 points.
Shares in Trainline were shunted into the sidings after a City broker downgraded its recommendation on competition fears.
Panmure Gordon went to ‘hold’ from ‘buy’ as it flagged the imminent launch of a Virgin Trains app and potential disruption from a rail review that will also look at fares.
Trainline (down 0.6pc, or 3p, to 500p) was floated last summer at 350p. So those lucky enough to nab shares at the IPO are now sitting on a profit.
Sticking with e-commerce success stories deemed slightly overvalued by the market, Rightmove (up 0.8pc, or 5.4p, to 676.6p) was on the wrong end of a downgrade to ‘underweight’.
The online estate agency group is facing some stiff competition from smaller rival On The Market, which advanced 7pc, or 5p, to 76.5p after inking a marketing deal with Bellway, Britain’s fourth largest builder by volume, who were also up, by 1.8pc, or 72p, to 4092p.
On The Market has struck similar transactions with Barratt
Developments (up 1.6pc, or 12.4p, to 809.6p) and Persimmon ( up 1.1pc, or 34p, to 3049p), providing sites users with access to over 700 developments. Delving into the small- caps,
RTC Group shot up 13.9pc, or 8.5p, to 69.5p after the recruitment and conferencing firm delivered an upbeat trading update highlighting its ‘extremely pleasing’ net debt position.
Long-term investment specialist Hansard Global saw its shares rise 2.4pc, or 1p, to 43p after reporting a strong uptick in new business for the first half of its current year. Intellectual property investor
Tekcapital rose 2pc, or 0.12p, to 6.25p after its portfolio firm Salarius unveiled a deal with a US ingredients supplier for its lowsodium salt substitute, Microsalt.
Oil minnow 88 Energy bobbed up 2pc, or 0.03p, to 1.27p after it managed to raise around £2.6m through a share placement to help fund development of its projects in alaska.
Turning to the fallers, water treatment specialist Modern Water plunged 30pc, or 0.38p, to 0.88p after it raised just shy of £1.9m in a steeply discounted share placing to help pay down its debts.
Columbus Energy fell 8.5pc, or 0.25p, to 2.7p after investors were rattled by news it will progress with testing its Saffron well in Trinidad without full analysis. ‘Super budget’ hotelier EasyHotel was kicked out of bed, falling 8.6pc, or 7.5p, to 80p as charges connected to its hotel in Ipswich sent it swinging to a loss in 2019.