Grocery market sees growth for 12th month in a row

Miranda Wadham
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Grocery market sees growth for 12th month in a row
Total grocery sales increased by 3.2 percent compared to the same time last year, according to the latest figures from Kantar Worldpanel, marking 12th consecutive period in a row that total market sales have exceeded 3 percent.
Ready meal sales were a strong driver of the results, with February festivities including Valentine’s Day and Chinese New Year lending themselves to the ready meal market. Sales of chilled ready meals jumped 26 percent over the month, with consumers taking advantage of retailers’ dinner-time set menu options.
Tesco (LON:TSCO) and Morrisons (LON:MRW) were “neck-and-neck” as the two fastest growing supermarkets of the big four, both reporting sales growth of 2.7 percent over the period. Morrisons hung onto its market share of 10.6 percent and entered its 16th consecutive period of growth, boosted by its premium own-label line The Best.
Overall sales growth at Sainsbury’s now stands at 1.1 percent, with Asda attracting an additional 309,000 shoppers to push sales growth to its highest since June 2014, 2.3 percent.
Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar Worldpanel, said:
“Aldi and Lidl once again battled to be crowned the UK’s fastest-growing supermarket. Aldi pipped Lidl to the post this month as sales grew by 13.9 percent and 13.3 percent respectively. With both discounters working hard to expand their store portfolio, Aldi and Lidl also benefited from increased shopper numbers as well as growth in basket size.
“Co-op returned to growth for the first time since July 2017 with sales up 0.4 percent, after a period of decline following the retailer’s sale of nearly 300 stores to McColl’s. Iceland held share steady at 2.2 percent compared to this time last year, increasing sales by 1.3 percent”.
Grocery inflation now stands at +2.9 percent for the 12 week period ending 25 February 2018, adding to the solid 12 weeks of price increases that have followed a period of grocery price deflation between September 2014 to December 2016.

McCarthy & Stone report H1 revenue rise, but shares sink

Miranda Wadham
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McCarthy & Stone report H1 revenue rise, but shares sink
Retirement home builder McCarthy & Stone (LON:MCS) shares tumbled nearly 4 percent at market open on Tuesday, after saying it expects a small rise in first-half revenue. Despite lower completion rates and an expected drop in first-half margins and operating profit, higher selling prices lent a boost to figures. The group confirmed half-year revenue expectations of around £240 million, around £2 million higher than a year earlier, supported by a 14 percent increase in average selling price to £296,000. Forward sales, including legal completions, are around 16 percent ahead of the previous year at £487 million, supported by 50 new sales releases during the period. The company said that trading had remained “resilient” during 2018 so far, and that new sales releases have performed well. Shares in McCarthy & Stone are trading down 3.99 percent at 132.50 (0838GMT).

Ashtead shares slip despite positive third quarter

Miranda Wadham
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Ashtead shares slip despite positive third quarter
Shares in equipment rental company Ashtead (LON:AHT) fell over 2 percent at market open, despite reporting increases in both profits and revenues for the third quarter. Underlying pre-tax profits rose 26 percent over the three month period to £205.1 million, with rental revenues increasing 24 percent to hit £845.5 million. EBITDA rose 20 percent to £408.8 million. The group said its end markets remain strong going into the fourth quarter of the year, adding that a wide range of metrics have shown “consistent improvement”. Ashtead invested £859 million in the form of capital expenditure and £315 million on bolt-on acquisitions in the period. Ashtead’s chief executive, Geoff Drabble, confirmed that full year results were likely to be in line with prior expectations. All our divisions continue to perform well in supportive end markets. While currency continues to be a headwind, we expect this to be mitigated by the strong underlying performance in North America”, he said. Shares in Ashtead are currently trading down 2.09 percent at 1,986.50 (0827GMT).

Just Eat shares plunge 14pc despite 26pc order boost

Miranda Wadham
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Just Eat shares plunge 14pc despite 26pc order boost
Online takeaway service Just Eat (LON:JE) reported a 26 percent boost in orders for the 2017 year, hitting a record 10 million orders in December alone. Total orders for the full year were at 172 million, up from 136.4 million in 2016, with revenue rising 45 percent to £546 million. Business was boosted by its Canadian acquisition of SkipTheDishes, which pushed total international growth up by 75 percent. Underlying earnings before income tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose 42 percent to £164 million. Peter Plumb, Chief Executive Officer, called 2017 a “record year” for Just Eat. “We helped 21.5 million customers order 172 million takeaways around the world. More Restaurant Partners joined our platform, increasing the breadth of choice for our customers and strengthening the Group’s geographical coverage to over 82,000 restaurants.” “As the new CEO, I will be increasing our investment in brand, Developing Markets and delivery services that will be engineered to complement our thriving marketplace business by bringing more choice to our takeaway-loving Customers.'” The group did post a loss for the period, but excluding exceptional items relating to its Australia and New Zealand businesses, it would have reported a profit before tax of £104.4 million. Shares are currently trading down 14.4 percent on the news at 728.80 (0811GMT).

Stocks & Shares ISA Comparison and Review – Which ISA to invest in?

UK Investor Magazine
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Stocks & Shares ISA Comparison and Review – Which ISA to invest in?
This Stocks & Shares ISA comparison breaks down the key points including charges, services and available products of a range of ISAs to help you conduct your own ISA review and decide which ISA to invest in.
Investors and savers are able to allocate a maximum of £20,000 in the 2017/2018 tax year as well as the 2018/2019, making it easier than ever to protect your investment gains from tax.

Hargreaves Vantage Stocks & Shares ISA

Arguably the best-known investment manager, Hargreaves Lansdown is the self-proclaimed UK number 1 ‘investment supermarket’ for private investors. In business for over 35 years, the group now manages over £82 billion for 983,000 clients. In terms of ISAs, one of Hargreaves’ biggest draws is their ‘ready made ISAs’, already loaded with a variety of funds and stocks based on your risk appetite. This is perfect for investors who don’t have the time or interest in searching out individual funds and stocks to invest in. However, if you are looking to choose yourself, the Hargreaves Lansdown website is full of useful ideas and research tools. The minimum account opening balance for a Vantage ISA or SIPP is £100. Charges range from 0.45% to 0.1% for funds held in an ISA with HL and 0.45%, capped at £45, for shares, ETFs, VCTs and bonds. Get more information on Hargreaves Lansdown ISAs here

Nutmeg Stocks & Shares ISA

Nutmeg is one of the robo-advisors that has taken the industry by storm, meaning their focus on technology is one of their key assets and integral in the investment process. An easy online process takes you through the setup, which can be done with no paperwork in just 10 minutes. A favourite with millennials and experienced investors, it offers transparent fees and relatively easy access to the investment world. Its performance also stacks up – Nutmeg now boasts five year performance ranging from 5.9% for conservative portfolios to a whopping 65% for their higher risk portfolios. You can open a Nutmeg ISA with £500 and a £100 monthly contribution, or a £5,000 lump sum. In addition to their 0.25 per cent-0.45 per cent automated service that earns them their Robo-Advisor title, Nutmeg offer a fully managed portfolios built by their investment team for 0.35 per cent-0.75 per cent. Get more information on Nutmeg ISAs here

Moneyfarm Stocks & Shares ISA

Moneyfarm is a robo-advisor founded in 2011, offering with easy online-access alongside personal customer service. The digital investment platform offering six levels of risk to choose from which will dictate the allocation of your assets between equites, a range of bonds and cash. Moneyfarm’s riskiest portfolio has returned 30% since January 2016 and least risky 6.9%. In October 2017, the digital wealth manager acquired the technology behind personal finance chatbot Ernest, with the group taking on Ernest’s CTO Lorenzo Sicilia to oversee technology integration. Ernest is a personal finance manager powered by artificial intelligence and designed to run on top of Facebook Messenger, with Moneyfarm planning to use it to offer more financial advice and a better solution for their customers. The minimum account opening is £1, but the company suggest £1,500 to take full advantage of the service. Get more information on Moneyfarm ISAs here

Interactive Investor Stocks & Shares ISA

In business since 1995, Interactive Investor say that over 40 per cent of new customers are referred by friends and family, which is ‘testament to II’s competitive pricing, systems and service.’ Interactive Investor merged with rival TD Direct in 2017, in a deal that made it the second largest execution-only broker in the UK. Under the deal, Interactive Investor acquired the shares of TD Wealth Holdings and TD Bank International, which make up TD Direct Investing, creating a group with £18 billion of assets and 300,000 customers. III is an execution-only broker, so does not offer advice – however, for DIY investors, it does offer a comprehensive range of financial services. The group’s fees actually increased in the wake of the TD deal as of December 2017, with charges going from £20 to £22.50 per quarter and the trading fee rose from £5 to £6. The minimum account opening is £100.

Barclays Investment ISA

One of the biggest institutions in the financial world, Barclays needs no introduction. The bank offers a variety of different ISAs, including several types of flexible cash ISA alongside their stocks and share investment ISA. Barclays ISAs are more attainable for smaller investors than several other companies listed here, due to their minimum account opening of £1, however they do charge a minimum of £4 per month based on a 0.1% pa fee.

XO.com

X-O.co.uk are a no-frills online broker offering some of the cheapest no strings attached sharedealing. The online broker is a trading name of Jarvis Investment Management, who have been in the business for 30 years. It is easily one of the cheapest platforms out there, charging a flat rate of just £5.95 per trade. The focus is very much on an unbeatable price rather than customer service – the basic platform is perhaps more suited to seasoned investors, who are looking for better deals rather than the support of research tools and investment ideas.

Fidelity Stocks & Shares ISA

Fidelity is another one of the UK’s largest investment managers, who have been a household name for the last 45 years. The company boasts over 273,000 people investing with them directly, 435,000 through their financial adviser, and another 480,000 through their employer pension plans. If good online access to your account is what you look for in an investment manager, Fidelity could be a good choice – its site and app allows you to trade 24/7 from your computer, smartphone or tablet for £10. Phone trades are more expensive, charged at £30. Offering investment in a wide range of Funds, ETFs and Investment Trusts, Fidelity charge a minimum fee of £45 or 0.35 per cent which falls to 0.2 per cent for assets over £250,000 and free for assets over £1m.

Scalable Capital ISA

Scalable Capital was one of the first online investment managers to hit the market, founded in 2014 and backed by some of the biggest VCs including Holtzbrinck Ventures, Monk’s Hill Ventures and German Startups Group. At one point it attracted 4 million euros in assets a week, making it one of the fastest-growing online platforms. However, due to its minimum investment requirement of £10,000, investment with Scalable requires a more substantial starting balance than some of its robo-advisor rivals.

AJ Bell Stocks & Shares ISA

AJ Bell was founded in 1995, with over £39 billion under management. Before the Interactive Investor takeover last year, AJ Bell administered TD Direct products. The company has a more complex payment structure than others, and offers both a stocks and shares ISA or a lifetime ISA, which is designed to encourage savings over a longer period of time. Dealing online with AJ Bell seems to be the best option – the group charge £29.95 per trade over the phone, and 1 per cent for dividend reinvestment. The foreign exchange charge on international dealing and foreign currency funds is 1 per cent. The minimum account opening for a lifetime ISA is £25.

Orbis

The Orbis Group started in 1989, when founder Allan Gray established Orbis Investment Management Limited. Today Orbis manages around £25 billion for some of the world’s largest companies and pension funds. Orbis Access, its sister initiative, was created to make investment services more accessible to individual investors. Orbis Access changed its name to simply Orbis and rebranded its website at the beginning of March 2018. Orbis hit the headlines for their fund charges, taking a “no performance, no fee approach”. Fees are paid on a performance-based basis – if the fund outperforms the benchmark, the fee will be half the outperformance. Orbis is the only ISA provider to refund investors in times of underperformance in the same manner as it charges; investors will receive 50% of any underperformance of the benchmark as a fee refund. There is no administration or custody fees on top – and you can invest either monthly or in lump sums, both from a minimum of £1. This article was originally published in the print edition of the UK Investor Magazine. For free delivery of our print edition, please click here to register your address. This review and comparison contains many, but not all, of the stocks & shares ISA available to UK investors. UK Investor Magazine may receive a form of compensation if you open an account by clicking some of the links in this article.

UK PMI figure slips in February

Miranda Wadham
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UK PMI figure slips in February
Growth in the UK manufacturing sector slipped to an eight-month low on Thursday, slowing down after November’s 51-month high. The seasonally adjusted IHS Markit/CIPS Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) figure came in at 55.2, showing the slowest month for the UK manufacturing sector in 11 months. Decelerations were seen across the consumer, intermediate and investment goods sectors; however, the figure came in just higher than the Reuters’ forecast. Any figure above 50 indicates growth. An increase was seen in new orders, which were higher than last month, with there seeming to be an increase in domestic demand alongside sold export figures. According to IHS Markit economist Rob Dobson, the figures suggest factory output growth so far this year has slowed to a three-monthly rate of 0.4 percent, compared with a robust 1.3 percent in the last three months of 2017. Manufacturers’ outlook remained positive, however, with almost 56 percent of companies forecast that output would be higher in one year’s time, compared to only 6 percent expecting a decline.

Hunting shares rise on strong performance from Hunting Titan

Miranda Wadham
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Hunting shares rise on strong performance from Hunting Titan
Energy services provider Hunting narrowed its losses during the course of 2017, causing shares to rise over 3 percent on Wednesday morning. The group reported a loss of $25.4 million for the year to the end of December, a narrower loss than the $170.7 million loss seen in 2016, after a strong performance by its logging arm Hunting Titan. The division reported units of production above those of levels seen in 2014, alongside strong sales of its H-1 perforating system were solid. Revenue rose to $722.9 million from $455.8 million the year before, with the group reported an underlying profit before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation of $55.4 million against a loss of $48.9 million in 2016. Jim Johnson, Hunting Chief Executive, said the Group’s results were “supported by an exceptional performance by Hunting Titan, leading to Hunting reporting a return to underlying profit for the year as a whole.” “Onshore drilling and completion activity in the US shale basins has led the strong recovery for those businesses within Hunting focused on this market. Elsewhere across the Group, cost cutting initiatives and general market stability have helped narrow losses. “We are pleased to have completed the process of exiting our suspension period bank covenants. While the Company is not proposing a dividend in respect of the 2017 financial year, shareholder distributions will be considered, subject to the Group’s current performance being sustained.” Shares in Hunting (LON:HTG) are currently up 3.62 percent at 630.50 (0953GMT).

Schroders beats market forecasts with 2017 figures

Miranda Wadham
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Schroders beats market forecasts with 2017 figures
Asset manager Schroders beat market forecasts during 2017, with underlying organic growth driving profits. The group reported a 23 percent increase in profit before tax to £760.2 million for the year just gone, attributing the improvement to an improvement in organic growth and “selective acquisitions combined with rigorous cost discipline.” Net operating revenue increased by 17 percent to £2,010.2 million, and net income before exceptional items rose by 15 percent to £2,068.9 million. These revenue figures produced a pretax profit in the year of £760.2 million, beating analysts’ mean consensus forecast of £728.5 million. The figures were also aided by a weakness in sterling in the first half of the year, contributed positively to profit before tax and exceptional items by around £27 million. Peter Harrison, group chief executive, said: “Schroders has again delivered strong results in 2017”. “Underlying organic growth and selective acquisitions combined with rigorous cost discipline led to a 24 percent increase in pre-exceptional profit. Assets under management and administration rose to a new high of £447 billion. “There are headwinds facing the industry but we continue to believe that there remain opportunities for growth. Our diversified business model, ongoing focus on costs, strong financial position and willingness to invest mean that we continue to be well placed.”

BBA Aviation moves back into profit

Miranda Wadham
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BBA Aviation moves back into profit
BBA Aviation (LON:BBA) swung into profit in 2017, driven by an improved performance in both flight support and aftermarket services. The group recorded a pretax profit of $175.5 million in 2017, after an $82.2 million loss last year, with underlying operating profit rising 19 percent to $360.6 million. Flight support underlying profit grew 12 percent to $329.4 million, with aftermarket services underlying operating profit grew 55 percent to $65.3 million. Wayne Edmunds, BBA Aviation Interim Chief Executive Officer, said 2017 was another “successful year for BBA Aviation” “The Group is focused on higher value-added, better IP protected, high ROIC and strongly cash generative businesses with encouraging prospects and the Board remains confident of good growth in 2018 with a good pipeline of further investment opportunities,” he said. Shares in BBA (LON:BBA) are currently down 0.99 percent at 341.40 (0902GMT).

Carpetright shares plunge 30pc after second profit warning

Miranda Wadham
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Carpetright shares plunge 30pc after second profit warning
Carpetright (LON:CPR) shares plunged nearly 30 percent on Wednesday morning, after the company issued its second profit warning in a year. The group said it was in talks with its banks, after trading conditions in the first few months of 2017 “remained difficult” due to “continued weak consumer confidence”. In a statement, the home furnishings retailer warned it expected to make a loss in the year to April, amid weak conditions in its key UK market. In January the group said its full-year profits would be between £2 million and £4 million, down from previous expectations of £14 million. “UK like-for-like sales remain below management expectations and the Group now expects to report a small underlying pre-tax loss for the year ending 28 April 2018,” the company said in a trading statement. Shares in Carpetright (LON:CPR) are currently trading down 27.46 percent at 56.44 (0849GMT).
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