Monday morning business bulletin

Jun 23 2008 By Andrew Mernin

Shares in struggling furniture retailer ScS Upholstery were suspended by the company today as it thrashed out a rescue deal.

Sunderland-based ScS, which has been trying to secure new working capital after a sales slump driven by the consumer spending slowdown, said it has received an approach for the entire share capital of its sole trading subsidiary.

The deal would result in "negligible value" for the shares of parent ScS Upholstery, the firm said.

``As a result, the directors of ScS have requested a suspension in the trading of the company’s shares with immediate effect," it added.

London’s new look FTSE 100 Index highlighted its leaning towards commodity stocks by posting strong gains in early trading today.

The latest quarterly reshuffle meant mining firm Ferrexpo and oil and gas services firm Petrofac replaced Persimmon and Alliance & Leicester in the top flight.

And with oil prices rising again, the Footsie reflected its shift towards the commodity sector to gain 44.5 points to 5665.3 in the first hour of trading.

Oil traders shrugged off Saudi Arabia’s pledge to increase its production if needed, focusing instead on disruptions to Nigerian supply and heightened Middle East tensions.

BP featured high on the risers board, up 8.5p to 573p, while Royal Dutch Shell added 25p to 1978p and Cairn Energy lifted 56p to 3202p. Among the miners, Anglo American gained 76p to 3511p and Xstrata lifted 68p to 4266p.

Temporary power provider Aggreko today said it expected a 40% rise in half-year profits.

The Glasgow-based company, which is helping to power the Euro 2008 football championships, said growth had been ``broad-based" but picked out profits in Europe as being "significantly higher".

Other regions including Middle East, Asia and Australia were all making ``good progress, the firm said, with North America the only territory where profits were lower so far this year.

Aggreko’s other notable power provision projects include the Glastonbury music festival this coming weekend, and the Beijing Olympics where it is installing 140MW of power across 37 venues.

The firm made £47.5m of pre-tax profits during the six months to June 30 last year.

Aggreko said: "The board now believes that profits for the full year are likely to be above current market expectations."

The pound at 9am was US$1.9667 compared to US$1.9733 at the previous close while the euro at 9am was £0.7911  compared to £0.7921 at the previous close.