Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News, The.
Speaker 2: Stock Movers Report, your roundup of companies making moves in
Speaker 2: the stock market, harnessing the power of Bloomberg Data.
Speaker 3: Time now to take a look at some of the
Speaker 3: stocks on the move today in Europe. I'm Stephen Carroll
Speaker 3: and I'm joined by Bloomberg's Breaking News editor Louise Moon. Louise,
Speaker 3: good morning. Let's start with W H Smith sheristown six
Speaker 3: over six percent in London. What's going wrong? So?
Speaker 1: WH Smith had confirmed this morning that they're under investigation
Speaker 1: by the FCA, so that's obviously the financial regulator here
Speaker 1: in London. So this is all This is an ongoing
Speaker 1: saga that's been happening for the last few months over
Speaker 1: a accounting era for W Smith and that the accounting
Speaker 1: era was focused in America. So W Smith set out
Speaker 1: their own findings. They had a probe that Deloitte implemented.
Speaker 1: They set up those findings in November and essentially one
Speaker 1: of the reasons that Deloitte found was that there was
Speaker 1: a lack of oversight for W. Brick Smith that led
Speaker 1: to the CEO resigning, their stock also slumping, and so
Speaker 1: today it's been announced that the financial regulator is looking
Speaker 1: into this, so that was kind of a key bit
Speaker 1: of news it's really been focused on. But also on
Speaker 1: top of that, and as a result of all of this,
Speaker 1: they've also cut their dividend for the first time since
Speaker 1: the pandemic. And these results were already delayed. They've been
Speaker 1: pushed back twice and in that time w Smith has
Speaker 1: lowered its outlook twice. So unsurprisingly, as you say that
Speaker 1: the stock is tumbling this morning and it's not recovering
Speaker 1: from the last few months, you know, you look back,
Speaker 1: I mean, well the year to date that they're down
Speaker 1: over about forty percent, and then there's the added losses today,
Speaker 1: so it could be heading for its worst year on
Speaker 1: record as a stock. So and this is saying, you know,
Speaker 1: the whole credibility hangs in the balance here, so we
Speaker 1: keep a close eye on the FCA's probe and what
Speaker 1: they find and what that could result in.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and want to watch, as you say, let's go
Speaker 3: to Spain next, BBVA announcing it's largest ever share buyback.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a slight slightly different story. They're a bit more
Speaker 1: of a positive one. So they're announcing just under four
Speaker 1: billion euros buy back. Yeah, large as ever, as you say,
Speaker 1: that's going to be in two stages and run for
Speaker 1: about a year, about twelve months, so the first stage
Speaker 1: will start on Monday. That's worth about one point five
Speaker 1: billion euros. This was quite expected. This large power was
Speaker 1: quite expected. So shares are hire but only just slightly
Speaker 1: ticking into the green. And the reason it's expected. It
Speaker 1: all comes after bbva's failed bid for Sabadults that collapse
Speaker 1: in October, which was quite a big setback for the CEO.
Speaker 1: He'd been working on that for about a year and
Speaker 1: a half and at the time they said that they
Speaker 1: would carry out what they called significant a significant share
Speaker 1: buyback instead. So this is part of their strategy to
Speaker 1: kind of draw a line under that failed bid and
Speaker 1: move forward. So this was quite expected. Estimates had ranged
Speaker 1: up to about six billion. But yeah, so announcing their
Speaker 1: largest ever buy back this morning and shares ticking higher
Speaker 1: on that.
Speaker 3: Okay, And you're also looking at shars and the French
Speaker 3: pharmaceutical firm Ibsen as well, they're lower this morning. What's
Speaker 3: going on they are?
Speaker 1: So just a quick one on them. Their midstage trial
Speaker 1: for one of their experimental drugs failed essentially, so this
Speaker 1: was for. This was an oral drug for a very
Speaker 1: rare bone disease, and it didn't meet the primary endpoints.
Speaker 1: The study gone on for five years and it's now
Speaker 1: going to be closed. So Alyss saying, you know, the
Speaker 1: hopes are dashed of developing this treatment. And I was
Speaker 1: just reading a good note from Bloombone Intelligence saying that
Speaker 1: this is disappointing. It was one of the few tools
Speaker 1: that Ibsen had to offset a lot of competition, and
Speaker 1: that this failure to develop this drug now highlights how
Speaker 1: important it is for them to go ahead with M
Speaker 1: and A to boost their growth. So, as you say,
Speaker 1: shares are falling quite heavily on the back of that.
Speaker 2: The Stock Mover's report from Bloomberg Radio. Check back with
Speaker 2: us throughout the day for the latest roundup of companies
Speaker 2: making news on Wall Street and for the latest market
Speaker 2: moving headlines. Listen to Bloomberg Radio Live, catch us on YouTube,
Speaker 2: Bloomberg dot com, and on Applecarplay and Android Auto with
Speaker 2: the Bloomberg Business app.