Bosses at Ladbrokes owner Entain have snapped up £2.4million of shares in a bet on the gambling giant – sending the stock higher.
In a vote of confidence in the outlook, chief executive Jette Nygaard-Andersen bought nearly £325,000 worth of stock.
She was joined by Entain’s chairman Barry Gibson and his wife Brenda, who together purchased more than £1million of shares.
Board members Stella David and Rahul Welde also increased their holdings.
The purchases were made on Tuesday, November 7, according to the latest stock market filing.
Having a flutter: Bosses at Ladbrokes owner Entain have snapped up £2.4m of shares – sending the stock soaring 2.6%
It came a day after Dodge & Cox, the San Francisco-based investment fund, doubled its stake in Entain from 5.01 per cent to 10.33 per cent. Shares rose 1.8 per cent, or 17p, to 958p.
The FTSE 100 fell 0.1 per cent, or 8.3 points, to 7401.7 and the FTSE 250 was up 0.5 per cent, or 84.6 points to 17,846.3
Associated British Foods rose for a second day following a strong set of results.
The Primark owner won support from the City as Bernstein and Deutsche Bank Research upgraded their target prices on the stock. Shares increased 2.5 per cent, or 57p, to 2307p.
Hiscox became the latest insurer to provide a positive set of results after written premiums rose 6.8 per cent to £3.06billion in the nine months to the end of September.
It followed upbeat results from Direct Line and Beazley in the previous session.
But there was little to cheer for two of Britain’s biggest investment platforms. Shares in Hargreaves Lansdown fell 2.3 per cent, or 17p, to 710.8p while AJ Bell was down 0.9 per cent, or 2.4p, to 272.4p after the broker UBS initiated its coverage with ‘sell’ ratings on both stocks.
Stock Watch – Eenergy
Shares in an AIM-listed green services provider shot up after a partner made a million-pound investment.
Eenergy helps companies reduce energy waste and take steps towards net zero.
It said London-listed Luceco, which supplies wires, EV chargers and LED lights, bought 35m shares for £1.75million in a bid to cash in on rising demand for green products.
Eenergy is also in talks over the sale of its energy management division. Shares jumped 43.8 per cent, or 1.8p, to 5.75p.
From May, Serco will oversee the process of installing and removing electronic ankle tags on offenders in England and Wales after the public service provider won a six-year contract worth £200million from the Ministry of Justice. Shares rose 2.4 per cent, or 3.5p, to 147.7p.
Economic turmoil, including a sluggish recovery in China and import restrictions in India, have hit sales of precious stones, according to Anglo American’s diamond arm.
De Beers, which mines in Botswana, Canada, Namibia and South Africa, said it sold £65million worth of diamonds between October 4 and November 3.
That was less than the £163million it sold from September 18 to October 3 and far below the £370million recorded during the same period last year. Anglo American shares dipped 2.1 per cent, or 44p, to 2095.5p.
Daily Mirror owner Reach will axe 450 jobs in a bid to cut costs. The newspaper publisher of nationals such as the Daily Star and regionals including the Manchester Evening News, announced two rounds of reductions in January and March.
Shares fell 0.2 per cent, or 0.2p, to 77.8p. But strong demand for newspapers over the football World Cup, the death of the Queen and Coronation of King Charles gave a boost to Smiths News.
Revenues edged up 0.2 per cent to £1.1billion in the 12 months to August 26 while profit rose 14 per cent to £31.8million. But shares fell 1.4 per cent, or 0.7p, to 48.2p.
Persimmon has poached the finance boss of Galliford Try, Andrew Duxbury, a day after it reported an uptick in sales activity since the start of October. Shares fell 0.2 per cent, or 2.5p, to 1143p.
Begbies Traynor has bought Andrew Forbes, a firm of chartered surveyors, in a deal worth up to £1million.
The newly acquired business will sit within the restructuring specialist’s property division Eddisons. Shares sank 0.8 per cent or 1p, to 122.5p.
The boss of GB Group, who has led the identity verification and fraud software firm since April 2017, is to step down at the end of January next year.
Chris Clark will be replaced by Dev Dhiman. Shares gained 1.6 per cent, or 4p, to 258.8p.
This post first appeared on Dailymail.co.uk
