Best of the Brokers for 8 July 2015 July 7, 2015 To appear in Best of the Brokers, email your research to notes@cityam.com AO WORLD Panmure Gordon has cut its target price to 114p from 130p and reiterated its “sell” rating. The broker said it expects AO World’s first quarter update on 21 July to show that it will struggle to meet full‐year market expectations, with [...]
Ultimate Products eyes sale or IPO and mandates Shore Capital March 15, 2016 The owners of Ultimate Products, which has the licence to sell Russell Hobbs products to retailers, has hired City advisers Shore Capital to explore a potential sale or IPO of the business. The Manchester-based firm could fetch between £50m and £60m, according to people familiar with the situation. Shore Capital has been asked to explore all [...]
London house prices: Homebuyers could pay up to 50 per cent more for views of the Thames river (and the Oxford-Cambridge boat race) March 25, 2016 Struggling for ideas on where to get a good view of this weekend's Oxford-Cambridge boat race? City A.M.'s guide to the 162nd race might be useful. Alternatively, you could buy a property overlooking the route in South West London. But be warned: new research has found homebuyers in this area could face paying a 50 per cent [...]
Property of the fortnight: Former Belgravia guest house Ormonde House in need of a £2m cash injection March 1, 2016 Belgravia is London’s land of grandeur, of embassies and white stucco-fronted mansions owned by Arab princes. It’s hardly the place you’d expect to find a fixer-upper, but Ormonde House is exactly that. And all it needs now is a millionaire with grand designs. It used to be a guest house, nestled in between Sloane Square [...]
Property of the Fortnight: Mayfair’s “upside down” house on the market for £7.25m February 23, 2016 A Californian-style party pad has entered the market in one of London’s most austere districts – and it’s a bargain at £7m, according its sales agent. The three-bedroom, six floor house in Hays Mews in Mayfair is unusual for UK buyers with its “upside down” layout, in which the bedrooms are to be found on the [...]
Neil Woodford-backed estate agent Purplebricks on course for triple-digit full year growth May 11, 2016 Purplebricks Group, the hybrid estate agent backed by Neil Woodford, has said it expects full year growth to reach "some 445 per cent". The figures The group, which will release official figures for the full year to 30 April on 16 June, said revenues would come in at around £18.5m, giving it a triple-digit growth [...]
Guy Hands’ Terra Firma mulls sale of Wyevale Garden Centres February 14, 2016 Guy Hands’ Terra Firma is considering a sale of its garden centre business Wyevale after four years of ownership. The private equity house has already been approached by several suitors and has also held talks with advisers to work on the sale including Goldman Sachs, according to The Sunday Times, citing a price tag of [...]
Brick maker Forterra lays plans to follow rival onto the London market with £450m float March 29, 2016 Forterra, the second-largest brick maker in the UK, is laying the foundations for a £450m float on the London Stock Market, looking to build on government plans for an increase in house building. Forterra, previously Hanson’s UK building products division, will list on the London Stock Exchange next month with a free float of at least 25 per cent. [...]
Rightmove: Cheapest boroughs fuel 11 per cent rise in London house prices as one agent warns it now takes 46 years to save for a deposit March 21, 2016 London house prices have climbed 11 per cent over the last 12 months, with the cheapest boroughs rising at the most rapid rate. The fastest growth was in Barking and Dagenham, according to the data published today by property website Rightmove. Asking prices in the borough, the capital’s cheapest, are 23.5 per cent higher this [...]
Country Living: Architect Gareth Hoskins brings modernism to the Lomond Hills February 25, 2016 The Duncan House was designed by the architect Gareth Hoskins OBE in 2002, located within the historic walls of a former fruit garden at the foot of the picturesque Lomond Hills, sixteen miles from St Andrews, in Fife. Full-height windows across much of the house give wonderful views across the surrounding landscaped gardens and make [...]