Wellstream shares up by 5.6%

Mar 6 2008 by Peter McCusker, The Journal

THE FTSE 100 Index managed to recover some of the week’s loses, following an opening rally on Wall Street.

The Blue Chip Index gained 85.8 points to end the mid week session on 5853.5, despite a number of companies going ex-dividend and immediately taking up a position on the FTSE fallers’ board.

Property companies were among the day’s strongest performers, fuelled by takeover speculation in the sector.

Liberty International was reported to be in merger talks with rival, Westfield Group, which would ultimately create the world’s largest shopping mall group.

In the Regional Portfolio, Barratt Developments and Bellway benefited from the news, seeing their shares rise 20.8p and 27.5p to close on 405p and 816p respectively.

Shares in Vertu Motors, the Newcastle-based owner of Bristol Street Motors, also traded higher after the company reported a positive pre-close trading update. For the period covering September to January the company reported like for like new retail car sales up 10.3%, significantly outperforming the broader new car market which was up just 0.8% in the same period.

The performance of the used car business was even more impressive with like for like volumes up 29.4%.

Elsewhere in the Regional Portfolio, shares in flexible pipeline specialist, Wellstream Holdings, traded 5.6% higher to finish the day on 1357.

Anna McKechnie anna.mckechnie@brewin.co.uk Brewin Dolphin act as broker to Vertu Motors