Premarket London: BP Says Don't Give up on Divvy; Next Sales Slow

Investing.com — Here’s a rundown of the most important regulatory releases from the London Stock Exchange on Wednesday, 30th October. Please refresh for updates.

• BP (LON:) PLC tried to repair the damage done by chief financial officer Brian Gilvary on Tuesday’s conference call when he said it was unlikely that the company would raise its dividend this year.
• “No decision has yet been made with respect to the 4Q 2019 or any future dividend. Any decisions with respect to future dividends will be made by the Board of BP (LON:) p.l.c. following the end of each quarter,” the company said in a brief statement.
• BP (LON:) had announced an unchanged dividend of 10.25c a share for the quarter. The shares now yield an annualized 6.29%.

• Next (LON:) said sales and profit growth slowed in the three months to Oct. 26 after a summery September stopped people buying its new autumn collection. Sales perked up as soon as temperatures fell in October, but the rest of the year is unlikely to be as strong as the last month, it said.

• Full-price sales rose 1.6% on the year, with store sales falling 6.3% and online sales rising 9.7%.
• The company maintained its guidance for the full year of a 5.2% increase in earnings per share and a 3.6% increase in full-price sales.

• Standard Chartered (LON:) reported third-quarter underlying profit before tax rose 16% to $1.2 billion, slightly ahead of expectations of $1.1 billion.
• Revenue rose 8% in currency-adjusted terms to $4.0 billion, while costs rose 1% to $2.5 billion and net interest margins were flat at 1.58%, defying the squeeze reported by most big banks from falling long-term rates in the quarter.
• The bank repeated its aim of reaching a 10% return on tangible equity in 2021, but warned of “growing headwinds from the combination of continuing geopolitical tensions and expectations of declining near-term global growth and interest rates.” RoTE in the third quarter rose 160 basis points to 8.9%.

• Packaging group Smurfit Kappa (LON:) indicated revenue and underlying profit growth slowed in the third quarter. Revenue for the first nine-months of the year grew 3% to 6.85 billion euros ($7.60 billion), down from a 4% increase in the first half.
• EBITDA rose 11% to 1,26 billion, down from a 17% increase in 1H
• EBITDA margin of 18.3% was up 140 basis points from a year ago but was unchanged from 1H
• Organic growth in Europe was 2% in both Europe and the Americas.

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