Source: Sharecast
STOCKS TO WATCH
Telecommunications giant BT said on Thursday that it has made "a solid start to the year" despite seeing total adjusted revenues slip 3% year-on-year to £4.87bn and adjusted earnings drop 1% to £2.05bn. Reported pre-tax profits were 10% lower at £468.0m, primarily due to an increase in net finance costs and depreciation and amortisation.
Energy and services firm Centrica said on Thursday that it had swung to a statutory operating loss in the six months ended 30 June. Centrica reported a statutory operating loss of £69.0m in H125, down from H124's £1.67bn operating profit and including a net loss on re-measurements of derivative energy contracts and impairments of assets of £618.0m, while adjusted underlying earnings fell from £1.43bn to £900.0m amid "a challenging backdrop".
NEWSPAPER ROUND-UP
British car and van manufacturing slumped in the first half of the year to its lowest since 1953 outside the Covid pandemic, as Donald Trump's US tariffs caused global industry chaos. UK vehicle manufacturing declined by 12% to 417,200 units in the first six months of the year, figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, a lobby group, show. – Guardian
Google exceeded Wall Street expectations for the quarter ending in June after closing out a few months of AI-related momentum. On Wednesday, the company reported $2.31 in earnings per share on $96.4bn in revenue, surpassing analysts' projections of $2.18 EPS on $94bn in sales. Google's chief executive, Sundar Pichai, pointed to "robust growth" in key spaces across the company including AI, search, YouTube and Google Cloud. – Guardian
The British Army has been trialling German-made kamikaze drones designed to detect and knock out Russian crafts before they can target troops. The Ministry of Defence has been working with Alpine Eagle, a German start-up founded in 2023 that has developed an airborne sentry drone capable of intercepting hostile unmanned aerial vehicles. – Telegraph
River Island faces collapse within weeks unless landlords and creditors approve a radical rescue plan, The Telegraph can reveal. The retailer has put forward a proposal to hand the keys back on 33 stores, slash the rents on a further 71 shops and write off a series of debts to stave off a severe liquidity crisis. The plan will be put before the High Court next week. – Telegraph
Tesla chief executive Elon Musk warned of "rough quarters" ahead as the electric carmaker reported the steepest fall in quarterly revenue in more than a decade and missed Wall Street's expectations amid faltering demand. Shares in the company dropped 4% in after-hours trading after he said the company was in a "weird transition period" as it coped with the end of US tax incentives on electric cars, shifting tariffs, and regulatory uncertainty around self-driving cars. – The Times
There is a growing consensus that house prices will barely rise this year, with the public increasingly wary of the uncertainty brought on by President Trump's tariff war and the possibility of looming tax rises. Savills, the estate agent, had expected UK house prices to go up by 4% on average in 2025. However, owing to a "weaker first half" than it anticipated, it has cut its growth forecast to just 1%. – The Times
US CLOSE
US stocks closed higher on Wednesday after Donald Trump announced the US had struck a trade deal with Japan.
As of 1445 BST, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.54% at 44,743.33, while the S&P 500 advanced 0.39% to 6,334.32 and the Nasdaq Composite came out of the gate 0.27% firmer at 20,948.40.
Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com