Sports Direct International Plc (LON: SPD) shares have rallied on Monday morning, as the firm gave a bullish update to the market.

Sports Direct has seen an impressive year of trading, with sustained profits through 2019. In a time where it seem that the high street is apparently collapsing evidenced by firms such as Mothercare, Sports Direct are not seeming to fail.

At the end of September, Sports Direct made an offer for Goals Soccer Centers, which saw shares in green.

Mike Ashley’s Sports Direct said in a statement that it had made a possible cash offer of 5 pence per share “for the entire issued and to be issued share capital of Goals, not already held by Sports Direct”.

Mike Ashley, had been hitting news headlines however, and after Ashley’s re-election earlier this year, the retail giant has been a big public image in the business world.

Ashley, at the end of October lashed out at the Competition and Markets Authority after alleged wrong market data was used in an investigation currently being carried out.

The response from Sports Direct comes as the CMA investigates the potential merger of JD Sports (LON: JD) and Footasylum (LON: FOOT).

Today, the FTSE250 listed firm aid its earnings increased in the first half of its current financial year despite a “very tough and challenging” retail environment.

The sports titan said pretax profit in the 26 weeks to October 27 grew 21% to £90.2 million from £74.4 million reported a year earlier, as revenue rose by 14% to £2.04 billion from £1.79 billion.

Sports Direct said that revenue growth was boosted by mergers and acquisitions, growth in Premium Lifestyle and Wholesale & Licensing divisions and the full period of revenue contribution from House of Fraser versus 11 weeks last year.

During the period, Sports Direct said it has experienced “some challenging events”, which included a tax inquiry in Belgium and the continued integration of a “broken” House of Fraser business.

Looking ahead, Non-Executive Chair David Daly said: “We are hoping that the political waters will be calmer in the coming months which will allow us to move out of this period of market unpredictability. This will enable us to plan appropriately for the future which is critically important.”

He added: “Despite ongoing challenges, we believe we are getting into a good place, building a solid foundation of elevation and efficiency which will lead to sustainable growth and a successful future.”

On the performance of House of Fraser, Ashley had his say: “It was, and it is only through the incredible efforts of those within the Sports Direct Group, including the remaining House of Fraser teams, that we are tackling these problems and trying to build a business with a future, a future for Frasers that is hopefully “bright”.

Ashley concluded “At the full year FY19 results, we concluded we could not reasonably predict where our FY20 results were going to land based on the uncertainty caused by the House of Fraser acquisition and the “significant operational and investment issues we are trying to rectify based on the appalling mismanagement of House of Fraser, prior to its acquisition by the Sports Direct Group, that led to its downfall.”

“As noted in the Chairman’s statement and below, House of Fraser is all but fully integrated into the Group, and is a work in progress to fix. The longer-term estate is still in the main to be concluded upon. However, given the seasonality of House of Fraser, something in the longer term we hope to address is the reliance on the Christmas period, and the fact our House of Fraser store estate – at least over this Christmas period 2019 – is secure means we are able to give Group guidance as we are confident in the outturn including House of Fraser.”

Shares in Sports Direct rallied 19.6% to 430p. 16/12/19 10:21BST.

Ferro-Alloy Resources Ltd (LON: FAR) have seen their shares crash on Friday afternoon as the gave a disappointing update.

The Ferro-Alloy Resources Group (“FAR”) is developing the giant Balasausqandiq vanadium deposit in Kyzylordinskaya oblast of southern Kazakhstan.

The ore at this deposit is unlike that of nearly all other primary vanadium deposits and is capable of being treated by a much lower cost process.

It is planned that output will be increased in stages to reach 22,400 tonnes of vanadium pentoxide per year, mostly in the form of ferro-vanadium.

The firm said its profitability and cash flows have suffered as vanadium prices fell more sharply than expected.

The drop in the price of vanadium pentoxide to its current level of around USD5 per pound from around $16 per pound at the start of 2019 has hurt Ferro-Alloy’s profitability as well as its cash flow. Despite being widely forecast, the price decline was steeper and more rapid than expected, the company said.

According to the firm, the reason was largely due to China’s initial lack of enforcement on its new higher construction steel standards and an abrupt increase in China’s vanadium production.

However, this enforcement is now considered to be “much stronger” and China’s vanadium production is likely to slow as prices stabilize. Ferro-Alloy’s long-term price forecast for vanadium pentoxide is $7.50 per pound, around the historic average.

“In the longer term the outlook for vanadium demand growth is very strong from its traditional market to steel-makers, putting upwards pressure on prices and necessitating the building of new supply which, other than by Ferro Alloy, is unlikely to happen until prices rise to considerably higher levels than today’s,” said Ferro-Alloy.

The impact of the fall in price was worsened by limited production whilst the firm was implementing the expansion of its vanadium concentrate processing operation. The building expansion is now complete and the first phase of new equipment for the operation are being commissioned.

Additionally, the firm appointed SRK Consulting and Coffey International to upgrade its feasibility study to Western bankable standards.

Ferro-Alloy Chief Executive Nick Bridgen said: “The expansion of the existing operation, the first phase of which will be operational by the end of December, and the advances we have made with our main project, give reasons for an optimistic outlook for 2020. The recent fall of the vanadium price from the frothy levels of last year can be viewed as a positive for the industry as it will allow demand to continue growing, particularly in the nascent flow battery industry, and will lead to the shut-down of high cost opportunist production. Furthermore, it highlights the clear advantage of the Balasausqandiq project, which is expected to become the world’s lowest cost primary supplier.”

In the mining sector, there have been updates. Coal miner Edenville Energy saw their shares rally on two investors which have said they intend to provided funding for their mining operations.

Additionally, Centamin PLC have seen their shares in green on Friday morning, as the firm announced a new interim CEO appointment.

Chief Financial Officer Ross Jerrard has been made interim CEO, following the departure of Andrew Pardey.

Additionally, the announced the FTSE250 listed firm appointed Jim Rutherford as a non executive director. He will then become deputy non-executive chair after 2020’s annual general meeting, when incumbent Gordon Edward Haslam departs.

Rutherford has over 25 years of industry experience and specialized in the global mining and metals sector, and has has much knowledge in the investment banking arena.

He currently works at FTSE100 listed Anglo American plc where is a non-executive director.

Shares of Ferro-Alloy crashed 22.94% to 11p. 13/12/19 15:09BST.

Royal Dutch Shell Plc (LON: RDSA) have seen their shares dip on Friday afternoon despite giving shareholders an interesting update.

Shell have seen a mixed few weeks of trading, and shares have been volatile over the past few months. At the end of October, Shell received a Halloween scare when they revealed that their profits took a bruising.

Shell saw their profits slump but they comfortably beat market and analyst expectations posting earnings of $4.8 billion (£3.7 billion), well ahead of the $3.91 billion anticipated.

This is the second time that this has happened during 2019 trading after second quarter results saw profits slow but the still beating consensus.

In this update, Shell joined fellow oil titans such as SABIC who reported an impairment loss of $400 million, and Total SA to report slower profits as profits fell 15% in the third quarter update.

A week after, the FTSE100 listed firm, announced that they would be merging with French firm EOLFI as part of its plans to expand into the oil major’s electricity business.

“We believe the union of EOLFI’s expertise and portfolio with Shell’s resources and ability to scale up will help make electricity a significant business for Shell,” Offshore Wind Shell vice president Dorine Bosman said in a statement

In an update on Friday, the firm updated shareholders about a $10 billion new credit facility. The new facility has been agreed with a total of 25 banks and replaces the existing framework valued at $8.84 billion.

It will also, in a first, have interest and fees linked to Shell’s progress in reached its short-term net carbon footprint target. Shell has targeted reduce its footprint by 2% to 3% by 2021.

“We are delighted to support the transition to new benchmark interest rates with this, market leading, syndicated SOFR facility,” said Russell O’Brien, Group Treasurer at Shell. “This is an innovative deal which also demonstrates Shell’s broad-based commitment to reducing the Net Carbon Footprint of the energy products we sell. We appreciate the strong support and commitment from our relationship banks.”

Shell has set an ambition to reduce the Net Carbon Footprint of the energy products by around 50% by 2050 and by 20% by 2035 in a time of high environmental awareness.

The move to promote environmentalism comes at an important time where multinationals such as Coca Cola HBC AG have added to the growing list of firms who have looked to reduce their carbon footprint.

The update concluded by saying “The $10 billion unsecured revolving credit facility consists of a five-year, $8 billion revolving credit facility, and a one-year, $2 billion facility. Each facility includes two one-year extension options at the discretion of each lender”.

“Bank of America and Barclays Bank acted as joint coordinators for the facility”.

Shares of Shell dipped 0.82% on the announcement and trade at 2,164p. 13/12/19 14:52BST.

Miton UK MicroCap Trust PLC (LON: MINI) have seen their shares spike on Friday afternoon despite the firm giving shareholders a modest update.

Premier Miton was formed in November 2019 from the merger of Premier Asset Management Group plc and Miton Group plc. They manage £11billion on behalf of a wide range of individual investors and institutions.

Shares in Miton UK rallied 5.27% to 51p on Friday. 13/12/19 12:15BST.

The firm said its net asset value per share declined in the first half of its year.

The firm alluded to the strain of Brexit on smaller stocks, with Nanoco Group PLC (LON: NANO) its worst performer. Nanoco is the market leader in the research, development, licensing and large scale manufacture of novel nanomaterials for use in various commercial applications

The slump from Nanoco was due to the fact that Nanoco’s largest prospective customer will not be using its new factory, despite having paid for all the new machinery.

Given the lessened chance of Nanoco generating enough cash funds in the next few years, Miton UK MicroCap sold its stake.

The venture capital trust’s NAV per share as at October 31 was 48.92p per share, down 13% from 56.13p at the end of April.

Gervais Williams and Martin Turner, Miton UK MicroCap’s investment managers, said: “Brexit anxiety subdued smallcap buyers, and hence the FTSE Smallcap Index excluding investment companies fell 5.9% and the AIM All-Share Index fell 8.2%. Generally, microcap share prices fell somewhat further, in part because their market liquidity is more limited as a result, the NAV of the trust fell 13% over the six months to October.”

Chair Andy Pomfret said: “As global growth falls back to pre-globalisation norms, we believe that a quoted microcap approach is advantageous. When economic conditions are challenging, the management agility that many microcaps demonstrate is important. Importantly, since acquisitions or mergers can turn out to be transformational, microcaps have a history of delivering much greater returns than those of the mainstream indices.

“In summary, the growth prospects for the UK economy may be no better than others. Importantly and uniquely, the UK stock market contrasts with others in that it has retained a vibrant universe of quoted microcaps over the period of globalisation. In a slow-growth world, the trust’s microcap strategy is particularly well-placed to deliver premium returns. Furthermore, since we believe that UK microcaps themselves are overdue a period of major performance catch-up, we consider that the Trust has the potential for strong prospects over both the short and the longer term.”

Following the election results announced this morning, an update has come from Centamin.

The firm announced the appointment of both an interim chief executive and a new deputy chair. Chief Financial Officer Ross Jerrard has been made interim CEO, following the departure of Andrew Pardey.

Centamin also announced the appointment of Jim Rutherford as a non executive director. e will then become deputy non-executive chair after 2020’s annual general meeting, when incumbent Gordon Edward Haslam departs.