YP75: Market moves up again after falling to three-month low

On Monday, Syntopix Group, the Bradford based speciality research group, announced final results. The company made a pre-tax loss of 1.1m for the fiscal 2010 compared with a pre-tax loss of 1.3m a year earlier. Revenue for the year ending July 31 was 151,000 in comparison to 190,000 for the 2009 results. The company is optimistic that further beneficial commercial opportunities will result from the Syntopix programmes over the next 12 months.

Tuesday saw the release of interim results by VP, the equipment rental specialist. The company from Harrogate said it expects margins to remain under pressure in a still subdued construction market but doesn't expect them to deteriorate. The company reported a 6.7 per cent decline in pre-tax profit for the six months to September 30 to 8.23m on flat revenue at 71.1m. The decline in margins reflects a weak performance at higher margin businesses like VP's Airpac Bukom unit which rents equipment to oil firms to test wells.

A half yearly report on Wednesday was made by Six Hundred Group, the diversified engineering company in which the company announced a pre-tax profit of 1.5m for the 26 weeks to October 2. This compared with a pre-tax loss of 5.8m for the same period a year earlier. The company confirmed no dividend would be paid and that it is well positioned for the rest of the year with the order book up 33 per cent on the year.

Wakefield based Redhall Group, a specialist engineering support services group said on Thursday that for the year ending September 30 pre-tax profit fell slightly to 4.5m on revenue up 12 per cent at 144.7m.

The company proposed a 9 per cent increase in the total dividend to 4.8p per share whilst the order book remains at a constant level to the previous year at 115m. The company stated it was well positioned in energy and defence markets with positive long-term drivers leading to the medium and long term prospects remaining extremely good.

On Thursday Straight, the environmental products and services group, said it had acquired the entire share capital of Tapmagic Limited a producer and innovator of water saving tap inserts for basin taps. Straight had already acquired 30 per cent of Tapmagic's share capital in March 2007 and bought the remaining share capital for a further 92,000 in cash pursuant to an option agreement entered into at that time.

Filtronic, a designer and manufacturer of microwave products for wireless telecommunications systems, announced on Friday that with regard to the acquisition it had received valid acceptances in respect of 14,764,364 Isotek Shares representing 99.2 per cent of the fully diluted share capital of Isotek.

Adrian Wasson Assistant Investment Manager