Financial News

LONDON (ShareCast) - After racing off to a fast start leading equities have largely consolidated the gains made in the first hour of trading.

Property stocks are among the best performers after a positive note on the sector from Evolution Securities, which has upped its ratings for British Land (LSE: BLND.L - news) , Liberty International and Segro (LSE: GBB1YFN97.L - news) .

National Express (LSE: NEX.L - news) chugs higher after it confirmed it is considering a merger proposal from rival bus and train group Stagecoach. It is also still pressing ahead with its plans for an equity issue to relieve its debt burden in the event the talk comes to nothing. FirstGroup (LSE: FGP.L - news) has definitely not made a move, it added.

Distribution group Bunzl (LSE: BNZL.L - news) has seen a slight improvement in revenues since reporting first half results and that it was benefiting from cost-reduction initiatives.

Bookmaker William Hill (LSE: WMH.L - news) suffered from the absence of draws in the Premier League and an unusual run of horse racing results in the last three months despite good volumes of business. However, the bookie said 'football margins have returned to being in line with historic trading in the latter part of September and early October,' which cheered up shareholders who had been fearing a Ladbrokes (LSE: LAD.L - news) -style downbeat statement.

The William Hill result seems to have prompted a reassessment of Ladbrokes' prospects, as the share price riders higher on the shirt-tails of William Hill.

Insurance group Standard Life (LSE: SL.L - news) has announced that its finance director David Nish is to succeed Sir Sandy Crombie as chief executive. Nish joined Standard Life on November (Frankfurt: A0Z24E - news) 1 2006, having held senior positions at Scottish Power (LSE: SPW.L - news) .

Elsewhere in the insurance sector Aviva (LSE: AV.L - news) retreats after announcing the details of its spin-off of Delta Lloyd, its Dutch financial services unit. The terms of the flotation value the whole of Delta at between €2.6bn and €3.1bn; Aviva is hiving off 42% of its Dutch subsidiary and expects to receive around €1.2bn from the share offer.

In broker action, telecoms firm Cable & Wireless is a rare blue-chip faller after Citigroup (NYSE: C - news) downgrade the shares from 'buy' to 'hold'. Meanwhile, being added to UBS (Virt-X: UBSN.VX - news) 's 'first 11' list has not prevented part-nationalised bank Lloyds Banking Group (LSE: LLOY.L - news) from moving into reverse. Fellow bank HSBC (LSE: HSBA.L - news) leaves UBS's first 11 list to make way for Lloyds.

Publishing group Pearson (LSE: PSON.L - news) eases after announcing the acquisition of training group A+RISE (Xetra: 915677 - news) , which will become part of Pearson's Teacher Education & Development Group.

Yellow Pages publisher Yell eases back after the company extended the deadline for a crucial refinancing deal by a week.

Printing group St Ives reported a full year loss as the group battles against extreme competition and an oversupplied market. The group, which prints the Economist and Vogue magazines, said loss before tax came in at £7.2m for the 52 weeks ended 31 July 2009 compared with a profit of £30.6m.

Petropavlovsk (LSE: POG.L - news) , the new name for Peter Hambro Mining, remains on track to produce 500,000 ounces of gold this year even though output fell in the three months to September. Total (FP.NX - news) production in the three months to September dropped from 124,300 ounces to 123,600 ounces. Total production for the year so far is 346,200 ounces, up from 268,900.

Allergy diagnostics company Omega confirmed a preliminary approach that may lead to an offer for the company.

Industrial fabric maker Low & Bonar said the improvement in sales levels in the second half of this year has been maintained in line with company expectations although they remain significantly below last year.

Shares in Senior rose after the aerospace and auto parts supplier said a stronger than expected third quarter contribution from its Flexonics division means that results for the full year are now expected to be towards the top end of current market forecasts.

Shares in Media Corporation (LSE: MDC.L - news) shot up after it said that internet search giant Google (NASDAQ: GOOG - news) had removed penalties imposed on two of the online advertising and publishing group's websites that reduced their rankings in search results. The penalties were imposed on www.gambling.com and www.creditcardexpert.co.uk in October 2007 'for unknown reasons', Media Corporation said.