Taylor Wimpey shares fell on Thursday after it released a full-year trading statement that could be considered a disappointment compared to its peers.

Taylor Wimpey has reported a slight decrease in completions for 2024, with total Group completions including joint ventures slipping to 10,593, down from 10,848 in 2023.

Persimmon recently reported a 7% increase in completions in 2024.

Average private sale prices fell to £356k from £370k in the prior year. However, the company saw improved sales momentum, with its UK net private reservation rate increasing to 0.75 homes per outlet per week, up from 0.62 in 2023.

The company ended 2024 with a robust order book valued at £1,995 million, representing 7,312 homes, an increase from £1,772 million and 6,999 homes in 2023. Despite this growth, the company noted weaker pricing in Southern England, with the order book showing underlying pricing approximately 0.5% lower year on year.

In terms of land investment, Taylor Wimpey significantly increased its land approvals to around 12,000 plots in 2024, up from approximately 3,000 in 2023, partly due to increased market opportunities before the Budget. The company maintains a substantial short-term landbank of about 79,000 plots and a strategic land pipeline of roughly 136,000 potential plots.

Looking ahead to 2025, Taylor Wimpey reports encouraging early enquiries but remains cautious, noting that growth in volumes will depend on mortgage rates and their impact on affordability.

The company also warned of increased build cost pressures resulting from the recent UK Budget. Despite these challenges, Taylor Wimpey expressed confidence in the sector’s long-term fundamentals and its position to address UK housing undersupply.

“Volumes aren’t expected to ramp up massively in the near term, and there has been some softness in the average selling prices of its houses at a time when some of its peers are seeing modest rises,” said Aarin Chiekrie, equity analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown.

“Taylor Wimpey also called out that the recent UK Budget is likely to increase build costs this year, putting some pressure on margins. With the current economic uncertainty, there’s likely to be plenty of ups and downs in the short term. But for investors looking for exposure to the sector at an attractive valuation, and a nice income stream while they wait for a recovery, Taylor Wimpey looks like a strong choice.”

IG Group Holdings has announced its acquisition of Freetrade, the commission-free investment platform, for £160 million.

Freetrade, launched in 2018, has grown rapidly to serve 720,000 customers with £2.5 billion in assets under administration by the end of 2024.

The acquisition aims to strengthen IG’s position in the UK trading and investments market whilst providing access to new customer segments. Some may see the £160m enterprise value paid for Freetrade as a bargain.

Freetrade has demonstrated steady growth, with revenue increasing by 32% year-on-year to £27.5 million in 2024. Freetrade’s revenue streams are well diversified across subscriptions, foreign exchange transaction fees, and interest income. The company achieved positive EBITDA for the first time in 2024, marking an important milestone in its growth trajectory.

The strategic purchase comes as the UK direct investing market continues to show strong growth at 10% compound annual growth rate with more investors taking control of their investments personally and financial literacy growing.

IG plans to operate Freetrade as a standalone business, retaining its brand and existing management team, including CEO and co-founder Viktor Nebehaj. The transaction is expected to complete in mid-2025, subject to regulatory approvals.

London’s flagship index jumped on Wednesday after UK CPI inflation fell to 2.5% in December from 2.6% in the month prior, and investors celebrated the potential impact on interest rates.

Even though inflation is still well above the 2% base rate, the simple fact that inflation halted its ascent sent a wave of optimism through UK assets after a gloomy start to the year.

UK stocks rose, bond yields fell, and the pound showed signs of stabilisation.

The FTSE 100 surged 0.7% higher, led by UK and interest rate-sensitive sectors, including housebuilders and utility companies. Even the banks joined the rally.

“A surprise pullback in the rate of inflation has given joy to investors,” said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.

“It strengthens the argument for the Bank of England to continue cutting interest rates and that’s fired up shares in housebuilders in the hope that mortgage rates will go down and more people will be able to afford to get onto the housing ladder. Banking shares jumped on the prospect of more demand in the mortgage market.

“The inflation reading has also helped to lower bond yields, with the 10-year gilt easing back a little to 4.841%, which will be welcomed with open arms by the under-fire chancellor, Rachel Reeves. However, the prospect of higher costs for companies this year still threatens to drive up inflation if they decide to raise prices, which means people’s living standards won’t suddenly improve because of today’s inflation reading.”

Although many problems still persist for the UK economy, there was little ill feeling in UK equities on Wednesday.

Barratt Redow, Taylor Wimpey and Persimmon jumped around 3%, while Howden Joinery added 3.6% in the hope lower inflation would spur building activity.

Lloyds was 3.5% as investors chose to focus on the financial health of Lloyds customer base instead of how interest rates could impact key profitability and income margins.

Diploma was the top riser, up 3.6%, after reporting organic revenue growth of 7% and maintaining full-year guidance.

There were few losers on Wednesday. Precious metals miners felt the pressure off improving sentiment while a broker downgrade hit Anglo American.

Tekcapital portfolio company Guident has announced the appointment of a US investment bank to conduct a private placement for the autonomous vehicle technology company ahead of a potential NASDAQ IPO later this year.

The investment bank will conduct both the private placement and the IPO raise.

“We are very pleased to have appointed an investment banker,” said Harald Braun, Executive Chairman of Guident.

“The AV industry is rapidly developing, and we believe that teleoperations is critical for the safe roll out of vehicles and robots. The adoption of autonomous vehicles globally is accelerating, and Guident welcomes the accompanying regulatory developments that put the safety of passengers and the public at the forefront of autonomous vehicle rollouts.”

Teleoperations are crucial to meeting many US states’ safety requirements, which stipulate autonomous vehicles must be able to be remotely controlled by a human operator in the case of any mishaps.

Meeting these requirements is a prerequisite to the roll-out of autonomous vehicles in states including California, Florida, Michigan, Arizona, Nevada, and Louisiana.

Tekcapital is yet to provide any insight into Guident’s potential valuation on a successful NASDAQ listing. However, the AV sector is attracting billions in investment, with investors prepared to provide funding at rich valuations to secure a piece of exciting early-stage AV companies.

WeRide’s initial public offering, combined with a concurrent private placement, generated $458.5 million in proceeds. Meanwhile, Waymo LLC has completed its largest funding round to date, securing $5.6 billion from investors. Pony.ai raised $260m at a valuation of over $5bn.

The weight of evidence from recent transactions and the revenue multiples investors committed their cash at suggests Guident could prove to be the jewel in Tekcapital’s crown with a valuation potentially many times Tekcapital’s current market cap.

Vistry shares rose on Wednesday after the house builder said they were on track to meet recently reduced profit guidance, providing hope that the worst of the cost miscalculation saga is behind them. 

Stripping out the impact of provisions for underestimating the costs at a number of their sites, Vistry had a fairly reasonable year. Completions are set to rise 7% to 17,200, and revenues are projected to increase 9% to £4.4bn.

However, the problems with Vistry haven’t been the sales; it’s been with the management of costs that investors will still have reservations about despite the upbeat assessment of sales and completion activities.

“After delivering three consecutive profit downgrades in the three months prior, Vistry has finally broken its streak of bad news. The trading update wraps up a truly disastrous 2024 for the group, where despite new home completions and revenue rising, profits have been on a downward spiral,” said Aarin Chiekrie, equity analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown.

“That’s largely down to the group’s strategy shift to a Partnerships-only model, where it teams up with local authorities and housing associations.”

“These partners foot most of the bill, freeing up Vistry to deploy its cash on more projects. That’s seen the group chase faster-than-average growth, but a series of managerial missteps and accounting issues that have led to profit downgrades have raised serious questions about the new structure and internal controls.”