Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News, The Stock Movers Report,
Speaker 1: your roundup of companies making moves in the stock market,
Speaker 1: harnessing the power of Bloomberg Data. Now, let's take a.
Speaker 2: Look at some stocks on the move today in Europe
Speaker 2: by Rache Levens with Stephen Carroll and we're joined by
Speaker 2: our reporter t at A Byota. Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 2: So Evoke it hit the jackpot, it seems though. They are.
Speaker 2: Their shares of jumped today and that's after the gambling
Speaker 2: firm has agreed to sell itself for two hundred and
Speaker 2: forty three pounds. It's up by as much as seventeen
Speaker 2: percent this morning. But a bit more about the deal.
Speaker 2: It's with Bali's Introlot. They've agreed to buy a Voke
Speaker 2: for fifty two pence per share in cash. That's according
Speaker 2: to a statement released by the companies today, and intro
Speaker 2: Lot is going to cap its cash payout there as well.
Speaker 2: Evo has seen some tough times. It's been struggling with
Speaker 2: its debt pile and this incoming UK betting tax that
Speaker 2: came into effect a few months ago. It's holding significant
Speaker 2: debt following its twenty twenty one acquisition of William Hill,
Speaker 2: and it is being further squeezed by these taxes which
Speaker 2: are focused on virtual casinos, and there is also an
Speaker 2: increasing regulatory burden on the sector as a whole as well.
Speaker 2: In March, the company announced plans to close two hundred
Speaker 2: Bessing shops. So that just shows you the pressure it's
Speaker 2: been under. But actually we had the CEO of Value's
Speaker 2: Interlocked Ropes and Reeves earlier in the program speaking to
Speaker 2: Caroline Hepka and Charles Cable, and he also cited this
Speaker 2: increase in UK taxes as a big reason for the
Speaker 2: pressure in the sex that he actually said that if
Speaker 2: there are further tax increases, he thinks there'd be only
Speaker 2: one operator left. So gives you an idea of the
Speaker 2: scale of these changes. But it's a nice bit of
Speaker 2: m and a arbitrage for Evoke this morning, really supercharging
Speaker 2: its share price, and we'll keep a close eye on
Speaker 2: Bally's plans for its progression as well.
Speaker 1: Okay, so that's Evoke. Let's turn to the text story though,
Speaker 1: and you've been watching the moves in ASML.
Speaker 2: Yeah, ASML, this is really a stock that's quite embedded
Speaker 2: into the textory that we've been following over the last
Speaker 2: few days. We've seen firms exposed to AI rally before
Speaker 2: trimming gains more recently, and that's really the story for ASML.
Speaker 2: It's down by just over three percent, and that's amid
Speaker 2: a broad retreat in chip stocks. It started yesterday and
Speaker 2: has deepened today. It's coming as investors are looking out
Speaker 2: for that US payrolls data. They're expecting it to confirm
Speaker 2: that interest rates will stay higher for longer. And for ASML,
Speaker 2: this dip is despite both Barclays and Bank of America
Speaker 2: raising their price targets for the firm yesterday. They cited
Speaker 2: increased confidence in ASML's ability to ramp up its supply
Speaker 2: capacity for chip making tools to meet the demand that
Speaker 2: it's seeing. It's hold off on the heels of increased
Speaker 2: estimates from UBS and JP Morgan as well, so a
Speaker 2: list saying that they're also seeing demand from China recovery.
Speaker 2: So some positive news from analysts, but the story here
Speaker 2: today is a dip, but broader confidence at least from brokers. Okay,
Speaker 2: and then what have we been seeing with Infinian tell
Speaker 2: us more about the moves have been going on there.
Speaker 2: So a similar story for Infinian another tech loser this morning.
Speaker 2: It's one of the biggest decliners amongst those broader tech
Speaker 2: losses that we're seeing in Europe this morning. It shares
Speaker 2: down as much as seven percent today. It's also been
Speaker 2: cut to a hold by MP Capital Markets, and the
Speaker 2: analysts there really summed up his decision by saying that
Speaker 2: although the operating performance is expected to stay solid, the
Speaker 2: current risk reward ratio is a bit less compelling, especially
Speaker 2: given its considerably higher valuation. But just to reiterate, this
Speaker 2: is very much a sector wide phenomenon today as a
Speaker 2: UBS basket of European semiconductor stocks and that's down four
Speaker 2: point eight percent, so really showing the weakness across the
Speaker 2: board as the rally that we saw earlier in the
Speaker 2: week starts to call.
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