London pre-open: Rally set to continue

15th May 2009 07:41

The surge seen in London late in yesterday's trading session looks set to continue this morning, with City sources predicting the FTSE 100 will open around 17 points higher than the previous close of 4,363.Petrofac has made a strong start to the year, chairman Rodney Chase will tell shareholders at today’s AGM, with the oil and gas facilities provider’s backlog doubling to $8.2bn at the end of April. Chase is confident 2009 will be another year of strong growth after its biggest business, engineering and construction, bagged $5bn of new contracts in the first quarter of the year.Punters did well at the Cheltenham Festival in March, but that was bad news for bookmaker Ladbrokes which saw profits plunge 34% in the first four months of 2009. It blamed the profit slump on abnormal gross win margin in March, increased free bets and unfavourable cost phasing in eGaming against the previous year.PV Crystalox Solar, which produces silicon wafers for use in solar power generation systems, expects first half revenues to take a 10% dive from last year’s half-yearly revenues. The company has seen a further decline in demand for its products since its preliminary results announcement at the end of March and has had been helping out some customers with temporary discounts.Product tester Intertek has made good start to the first four months of the year, boosted by the weakness of the pound. Total revenue for the first four months of 2009 increased by 42% at actual exchange rates.IT services company Computacenter said it expects first half profit to be well ahead of the same period the previous year after seeing strong trading in the first four months of 2009.Revenues slumped in the first four months of 2009 at radio and TV broadcaster UTV, with the Ulster-based media group also cautious over the rest of the year.Book publisher Bloomsbury has issued a mixed trading statement, with the UK and US trading well but German operations experiencing difficulties. The company said that, while UK retailers are returning more books than anticipated trading is in line with expectations. The US business is in line with budget, Bloomsbury said,Coal miner UK Coal said production since the end of the first quarter has continued broadly in line with expectations. Poor weather hit surface mine production at the start of the year, as did a relatively increased focus on stripping overburden, but this production is expected to be recovered during the year.