THE DAILY BRIEFING
STILL MOTORING Car sales will continue to grow despite the vote to leave the european Union, one of Britain’s biggest dealers has said.
Marshall Motor Holdings reported a 31pc rise in revenue to £826m for the first half of 2016. The dividend has been hiked from 0.58 to 1.8p and shares rose 5pc or 7.5p to 159p. BOSS FIRED swedish lender Handelsbanken has fired chief executive Frank Vang-Jensen after 18 months in the job.
He had ruffled feathers by trying to impose more control on branches, which have an unusual degree of independence, and has been replaced by UK boss anders Bouvin. EARNINGS DROP Profits at housing services firm Mears fell 13.3pc to £12.8m in the first six months of 2016. The dip was driven by lower margins and the start of several contracts, which generate less money in their early phases.
Mears will pay a dividend of 3.3p per share, up 6pc. PROFITS PLUNGE Wood Group profits dropped as the falling price of crude continued to cause pain.
Profit for the first half of the year was down 63.2pc to £34.6m, flagging a ‘challenging oil and gas market’.
Turnover at the energy services firm fell 16.6pc to £2bn. SHARE WINDFALL The new boss of low-cost african airline Fastjet has been handed share options which could make him a £472,500 windfall if the share price reaches 63p. Yesterday it was at 27.25p.
nico Bezuidenhout will have the option to buy 1.5m shares at 31.5p over the next five years. STERLING RALLIES The pound rallied against the dollar yesterday due to surprisingly strong inflation figures and expectations of further price rises.
Inflation rose to 0.6pc in July from 0.5pc in June. sterling rose around 1.2pc back above $1.30 on speculation it had been oversold. SWEDE DEAL Persil owner Unilever is expanding into air purification after buying sweden’s Blueair. Blueair makes products which improve air quality and is big in China, the Usa, Japan, south Korea and India and turned over £82.1m last year. RETAILER SOLD Morrisons has sold its 10pc stake in Us online food retailer Fresh direct for £45m as the firm continues to break with former boss dalton Philips’ strategy. It bought the stake in 2011 as it was preparing to launch into the online grocery market under the name Philips. CONFIDENCE VOTE danish colostomy made bag a £147.8m maker profit Coloplast, in the which three months continue to to June invest 30, in has Britain said despite it will the vote to quit the european Union.