Small caps round-up: Elementis, Sportswinbet, Northgate ...

26th Jun 2009 13:16

Chemicals firm Elementis said trading patterns for the second quarter of the year appear to have stabilized, following the significant drop in sales volume at the end of last year."It is anticipated that Specialty Products, Chromium and the Group will have a positive operating profit for the first six months of 2009, before previously announced one time closure and over-hedging costs," it added. Sportswinbet moved into the black last year but warned that its branded sports book operation has run into operational issues since the beginning of the year as a result of attempts to scale up the operation. If these issues cannot be resolved in the next few months, this year's revenue from the sports book is likely to be lower than the 2008 levels, and the book may be discontinued.In 2008 the company made a pre-tax profit of £0.32m, versus a loss of £0.1m in 2007. Revenue more than doubled from £0.21m to £0.50m.Van and car hirer Northgate has renegotiated its loan facilities with its major lenders, subject to an equity fund raising.Pending the completion of the fund raising, the banks and private placement note holders have agreed, once again, to defer the date for certain covenant tests, this time until 31 August 2008. The lenders had previously agreed to putting the date of the covenant tests back to the end of June.Shares in iron ore, base and precious metals explorer Baobab Resources jumped after it said it had completed a drilling campaign at its Tete iron/vanadium/titanium project.Jewellery designer Abbeycrest saw losses escalate sharply as a result of restructuring costs last year. Loss before tax widened to £10.13m in the year to 28 February 2009 from a loss of £3.53m the year before. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortisation and exceptional items fell to £2.03m from £2.63m. Revenue declined to £53m from £61.9m the year before, as the company ceased chasing volume and focused more on high margin products.Mobile computing software firm Psion has appointed John Hawkins as its chairman designate to replace Dr. David Potter, who will step down from the position at the end of September 2009.Hawkins, aged 55, has been a member of the Psion board since 2002, having previously been President (Europe) of Philips NV.