Market report: Monday close

CANADIAN billionaire Galen Weston has moved in for the kill in his £628m battle for control of department store group

On Friday, he waded into the market and bought more than 10m shares, paying 387p each. It raises his holding to 29.9m shares, or 19.38%. Brokers say he can rely on a further 20% of acceptances from other shareholders.

He is currently offering 387p a share and has succeeded in deterring a rival offer from Aletheia Partners, the vehicle of Scott Lanphere and Robert Tchenguiz. They said before the weekend that they no longer wished to press ahead with their offer. Selfridges was rose 1p to 388 1/2p, only 1 1/2p above Weston's terms.

The demerger of Kingfisher's electrical retailing operations held centre stage in early trading. Its Kesa Electricals, made up of Comet over here and BUT and Darty in France, opened at 190p before peaking at 202p and settling on 189p.

The restructured Kingfisher was up 9 3/4p at 284p. US investment bank JP Morgan has raised fair value on the shares from 280p to 310p. Spread bookie Cantor Index is making a price in Kesa of 185p to 200p and 275p to 280p in Kingfisher. Woolworths was static at 37 3/4p after a store visit by brokers.

The rest of the market sported useful gains, supported by a near 200-point rise for the Dow this afternoon. Wall Street was closed on Friday for Independence Day. In thin trading, the FTSE 100 finished the day up 53.3 at 4074.8.

ICI led the top 100 companies higher with a jump of 10 3/4p to 134 1/2p on turnover of 29m shares. It was fuelled by claims that German rival Henkel wants to buy its National Starch subsidiary for £1.6bn. ICI says it is not for sale.

Manchester United, up 15 3/4p at 160 3/4p, is again being tipped as a takeover target. Hot on the heels of last week's takeover of Chelsea, speculation is now mounting that United may be the next target for a wealthy Russian. Such an outcome may suit some of United's biggest shareholders, including Irish financiers John Magnier and JP McManus.

AstraZeneca jumped 77p to 2565p. The US Food and Drug Administration meets on Wednesday to review its approval of the fatbuster treatment Crestor. Broker Merrill Lynch sees a positive outcome and has set a year-end target price of 3000p.

Compass, the world's biggest caterer, will be running canteens for oil workers in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Oman under a contract worth £36m a year struck today with oilfield services group Schlumberger. Compass rose 6 1/4p to 342 3/4p.

Green-fingered gardeners shelped Wyevale Garden Centres keep its market share thanks to a series of '10% Discount Tuesdays' for the over-60s. Interim sales rose 8.6% and like-for-like sales by 2%. Wyevale fell 1 1/2p to 377 1/2p.

Express Dairies retreated 2 1/4p to 36 3/4p after the bid from Arla Foods was referred to the Competition Commission. Property giant British Land was 3/4p dearer at 476p despite US securities house Morgan Stanley cutting its target price from 475p to 420p. Rents at its Broadgate development in the heart of the City are continuing to fall.

Buy-to-let property specialist Paragon jumped 16p to a record high of 304p after last week's acquisition of centralised mortgage provider Britannic Money.

Prices and indices in this section are supplied from various sources and calculated at different times and may not always match those listed on the site.