BUSINESS LIVE: Raspberry Pi profits surge; AG Barr shrugs off cocktails dip; Card Factory hit by wage inflation

British Airways has cancelled all flights to and from Tel Aviv in response to the recent security escalation between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The airline company said it is temporarily suspending flights to the region and will resume its services there in 48 hours.

(PA) – The paint giant behind Dulux is to cut about 2,000 jobs in a bid to slash costs.

AkzoNobel announced on Tuesday that it plans to complete a raft of redundancies by the end of 2025 to make its operations more efficient.

The Dutch group, which has operations in 150 countries including the UK, said it will “streamline” its management structure through the cuts.

The move will impact more than 5% of its 35,700 global employees.

AkzoNobel has around 3,500 employees in the UK and Ireland across 15 sites, including nine factories. The firm has not disclosed how many UK staff will be impacted.

The group’s cost-cutting efforts come amid a backdrop of continued inflation in the building materials industry and higher wages.

The future of London’s AIM market is ‘delicately balanced’ with ‘many’ firms considering delisting, the chief executive of energy supply challenger Yu Group has warned.

Bobby Kalar told shareholders on Tuesday he was disappointed by a lack of engagement from large institutional investors and frustrated by a ‘lack of recognition’ of the company’s financial performance.

AG Barr sales were boosted by strong soft drink demand in the first half despite ‘disappointing early summer weather’, helping to offset weakness in its cocktails unit.

Total revenues increased by 5.2 per cent to £221.3million in the six months to 27 July, thanks to 7 per cent jump in the Irn-Bru maker’s soft drinks business on the back of higher prices and volumes.

Card Factory shares plunged in early trading on Tuesday as the high street chain reported a sharp fall in first half profits.

The greetings card retailer revealed pre-tax profits declined by 43.3 per cent to £14million in the six months ending July, which it partly attributed to higher staff costs.

Dunelm shares fell on Tuesday after the homeware brand’s biggest investors sold off a chunk of its holding in the company.

Sir Will Adderley, who also serves as Dunelm’s deputy chair, sold 10 million shares in the business at a value of 1,140 each via his holding company WA Capital, a stock market filing shows.

Smiths Group has revealed the acquisition of two North American companies after seeing sales and profits rise over the last financial year.

The FTSE 100 engineer said it has acquired Modular Metal Fabricators and Wattco for a combined fee of up to £110million.

Raspberry Pi’s profits soared in the first half of 2024 as the group enjoyed strong demand for one of its recently launched single-board computers.

The budget computer maker, which went public on the London markets in June, revealed adjusted earnings before nasties jumped by 55 per cent to $20.9million (£15.6million) in the six months ending June.

Lloyd’s of London’s boss has sounded the alarm over plans to bring in a raft of workers’ right saying it was vital to ‘get the balance right’.

John Neal, who has battled to bring staff back to the three-century old insurance market after the pandemic, said: ‘The employee’s got to understand that they’re being paid to do a job.’

Until quite recently, there was an unhelpful habit of UK company boards rapidly buckling when faced with overseas and private equity takeovers.

There would be dire warnings from fee-hungry investment banks that failure to accept seemingly generous offers would breach fiduciary duty.

Shares in an Anglo-Canadian semiconductor company plunged after it warned the merger of two large artificial intelligence (AI) customers in South Korea would hit business.

Alphawave IP Group said the Korean tie-up alongside delays to the final design of chips have affected its outlook.

Rupert Murdoch is edging closer to a takeover of Rightmove – though a higher offer may be needed to secure the deal.

Australian property firm Rea Group, which is majority-owned by the media tycoon’s News Corp, has tabled a third offer, worth £6.1billion, for the property website.

One of Britain’s fastest-growing drinks brands has made its first ever profit as fans including Victoria Beckham help push annual sales to £35million.

Dash Water, which was set up in 2017 and uses wonky fruit rejected by supermarkets to flavour sparkling water without sugar, is set to post pre-tax profits of £74,900 for 2024.

Card Factory’s first-half profits plunged after the National Living Wage hike caused employee costs to surge and wet weather led to lower high street footfall.

The card seller revealed its pre-tax profits slumped by 43 per cent to £14million in the six months ending July as its direct store and warehouse wage bill increased by over a quarter to £64.4million.

Following the trading update, the firm’s shares plunged by over 16 per cent to 119.6p on Tuesday morning.

Adam Vettese, market analyst at investment platform eToro, said: Some investors might see the chance to pick up shares at a 20% discount this morning, for less than the price of one of their greeting cards, if they believe the company can turn it round in the latter part of the year.

When Duncan Wanblad embarked upon the biggest shake-up in Anglo American’s’s 107-year history to fend off the unwanted advances of Australian mining behemoth BHP, he set himself a stiff challenge.

This challenge has become more daunting by the day in the four months since the miner’s chief executive told shareholders of his intention to sell the FTSE 100-listed company’s nickel, coal, De Beers diamond and platinum businesses within two years.

Marks & Spencer shares are set to jump to their highest level in nearly nine years as it continues to woo new customers, according to analysts.

In another vote of confidence in the High Street stalwart, a report by UBS said the stock would rise to 435p in the coming year.

Julie Palmer, partner at Begbies Traynor, comments on AG Barr’s results:

The soft drinks giant has been focused on refining its strategy to cement its leading position in a competitive market for some time and it’s paying off.

By expanding its portfolio beyond the iconic Irn Bru into more diverse areas, from oat milk to cocktails, AG Barr has laid the foundations for future growth, which should be further supported by anticipated manufacturing synergies.

The maker of Scotland’s favourite soda is clearly willing to adapt to changing consumer trends which should stand it in good stead as it contends with an uncertain consumer confidence and ongoing cost pressures.

With the share price reaching five-year highs and positive performances abounding, new CEO Euan Sutherland seems to have stepped into the role at a fortuitous moment.

Irn-Bru maker AG Barr has revealed a rise in sales for the past six months amid strong soft drink demand despite “disappointing early summer weather”.

The Scottish firm however revealed a decline in profits due to one-off costs related to the closure of the Barr Direct delivery operation earlier this year and the integration of Boost, the energy drink business it bought in 2022.

Nevertheless, recently appointed boss Euan Sutherland said he was “pleased to report a strong set of first-half results”.

The company revealed that total revenues increased by 5.2 per cent to £221.3million for the six months to July 26.

This was driven by its soft drink business, which saw 7 per cent sales growth on the back of increased pricing and higher sales volumes from customers.

The company said this came despite a slight volume decline in the wider UK soft drink market, which was “partly as a consequence of the disappointing early summer weather”.

The pound hit €1.20 against the euro last night for the first time in more than two years as figures suggested Germany was on course for a recession.

Sterling was up by nearly a cent against the single currency at levels not seen since April 2022 – as monthly business survey data showed a stark contrast between the UK and eurozone.

Raspberry Pi profits surged in the tech group’s first six month reporting period as a London-listed company, as strong demand for higher margin products offset weaker than expected sales volumes.

The group, which raised £178.9million when it debuted on the FTSE 250 in June, said sales surged 61 per cent to $144million in the six months to 30 June.

This saw adjusted earnings before nasties climb 55 per cent year-on-year to $20.9million.

‘The IPO was the watershed moment of the first half, with Admission to trading just two weeks before the period end. In continued pleasing trading in the first half, we saw strong uptake of our latest flagship SBC, Raspberry Pi5, the launch of the Raspberry Pi AI Kit, and the successful ramp to production of RP2350, our second-generation microcontroller platform.

‘The higher than usual customer and channel inventory levels which were evident at the time of the IPO have continued to unwind, and there is a growing sense that this will have concluded by the year end. We have an extraordinary team, a world class product set backed up by an exciting future roadmap, and a loyal and engaged customer base that we can continue to grow. In the second half, we have further planned product releases and a number of initiatives to further expand our engagement within our Industrial and Embedded market.’