Market wrap: Intu’s crash on no new cash
Against a rising market, shares in intu Properties plunged on Wednesday after the shopping centre REIT revealed that plans for a £1.5bn equity raise had failed and that it is now exploring alternative options to fix a battered balance sheet.
As analysts said the company’s future is now “in the hands of its lenders”, intu’s shares dropped as low as 5.99p during trading before closing down 41% at 6.28p, the day’s biggest fall in the FTSE All-Share. That gives the company a market capitalisation of £144m.
The company’s shares have now shed more than 80% of their value since the start of the year, and analysts predict that a debt-for-equity swap is now on the cards. Intu will report its 2019 results on 12 March.
Against a rising market, shares in intu Properties plunged on Wednesday after the shopping centre REIT revealed that plans for a £1.5bn equity raise had failed and that it is now exploring alternative options to fix a battered balance sheet.
As analysts said the company’s future is now “in the hands of its lenders”, intu’s shares dropped as low as 5.99p during trading before closing down 41% at 6.28p, the day’s biggest fall in the FTSE All-Share. That gives the company a market capitalisation of £144m.
The company’s shares have now shed more than 80% of their value since the start of the year, and analysts predict that a debt-for-equity swap is now on the cards. Intu will report its 2019 results on 12 March.
Rival Hammerson also posted a fall, its shares dropping by 4.7% to 191.2p.
Online travel agency Hostelworld slumped by 8.3% to 96.3p after it revealed in its preliminary 2019 results that the spread of the coronavirus had caused “a material reduction in bookings” since late January.
“Given that the depth and duration of the virus outbreak is impossible to forecast at this time, we are unable to calibrate its effect for the balance of the year,” the company said. “However, if near-term trends were to persist to the end of March, we estimate the impact to EBITDA to be in the range €3m to €4m for Q1 2020.”
The FTSE 100 closed up 97 points at 6,815, while the FTSE 250 was up 60 at 19,742. The FTSE All-Share gained 41 points at 3,790.
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