London afternoon: Back to square one

27th Sep 2010 14:20

The market really can't make up its mind today, with the Footsie now back at Friday's closing level after opening firmer and then turning lower this morning.Unilever is the best performer. The household products group is paying $3.7bn (£2.3bn) in cash for America's Alberto Culver, adding the TRESemmé, Nexxus, VO5, St Ives and Simple brands to the conglomerate's portfolio. It should also deliver "significant" synergies and, excluding restructuring costs, will be accretive to earnings per share (EPS) in the first full year, said the owner of Dove, Clear, Sunsilk, Pond's and Vaseline.Fellow consumer products group PZ Cussons is to buy fake tan products specialist St. Tropez Holdings. The Imperial Leather soap owner is paying £62.5m to private equitygroup LDC to get its hands on St. Tropez which has a product range that includes lotions, mousses, sprays and other products serving consumers who wish to achieve a safe, natural looking tan without roasting on a sun bed or on the beach. AstraZeneca's prostate cancer treatment zibotentan showed little patient benefit in the first of three late stage trials, the drugs giant has revealed. Private equity group 3i is to buy debt management business Mizuho Investment Management for an enterprise value of £18.3m.Wolseley, supplier of goods to the plumbing and heating trade, is to shift its tax base to Switzerland and resume paying dividends. Although revenue for the year to 31 July fell 9%, or 10% in constant currency terms, to £13.2bn, this was above the market consensus of £13.1bn, while the fourth quarter saw an encouraging 4% gain in like for like sales.Chairman John Whybrow has also announced he will be replaced by Gareth Davies, currently the board's senior non-executive director and former chief executive of Imperial Tobacco.The shares eased back on the news but Charles Stanley is becoming a fan of the stock. "For 2011, the group appears happy with the consensus EPS [earnings per share] estimate which is 112p. However, there is a broad range of estimates between 83p and 130p. Our 2011 EPS estimate is 117p which places the share on a prospective PE [price/earnings ratio] of 13x," noted Charles Stanley analyst Tony Shepard. "We expect another year of strong cash generation and deleveraging of the balance sheet to pave the way for a return to the dividend list. The new team has made an encouraging start and we move our recommendation to Accumulate from Hold," the broker said.Broker comment is less kind to technology firm Smiths Group, which has been downgraded to "neutral" from "buy" by BofA Merrill Lynch, but leisure group Whitbread is wanted ion the back of an upgrade by Credit Suisse.Spice, the provider of management services to utility firms, has finally agreed terms of a takeover by European buy-out specialist Cinven worth £251m, or 70p a share in cash. Specialist health and social care business Healthcare Locums reported a decline in half year pre-tax profit after the new coalition government slashed NHS spending.North Falkland Basin oil and gas explorer Rockhopper confirmed today it has plugged and abandoned the Sea Lion 1 well while it pores over the drill and test results. Sea Lion 1, the first oil discovery in the area, said it now has to look at the data and plan the next phase in proving the reserves discovered.