Westhouse encouraged by trading at Kier Group

2nd Jul 2014 12:24

Westhouse Securities has repeated its 'buy' recommendation for construction, support services and property outfit Kier Group, saying that "trading continues to encourage".The company said on Wednesday that its underlying trading performance for the year to June 30th "remains on course" with "good visibility of earnings" for 2015."It is encouraged by its 'strong' pipeline of opportunities, which backs our view that the construction market in particular is recovering strongly," said Westhouse Analyst Alastair Stewart.He said that Kier's Capital Markets Day on Thursday should also provide further encouragement and demonstrate the company's "unique and inter-related breadth of services"."This is not always fully appreciated, in our view, but we believe the company will demonstrate these well at tomorrow afternoon's Capital Markets Day and this may provide a positive catalyst for the shares," Stewart said.Westhouse has a 2,110p target price for the shares, which were up 3.8% at 1,850p by 12:28.BC