Vikings launch raid on Singer

ANOTHER Viking share raid set

Several large lumps of stock totalling 19.4m were traded at 260p, leading excited dealers to believe that S&F was finally going to be on the receiving end of a bid.

No such luck. Kaupthing later confirmed it had increased its holding from

9.5% to 19.53% but has no current intention of bidding. Chairman Sigurdur Einarsson said: 'We see good value in S&F and we intend to be a supportive shareholder.' Those comments saw many punters run for the exit. The stock fell to 239p before rallying again to finish 8p up at 245p.

One fund manager said: 'Kaupthing can say what it likes, but no way is it just a passive investor.' It raised £340m in a bond issue last year and has all the finance in place to swallow S&F.

Hopefully it will do so before chief executive John Hodson has a chance to spend any of the £80m-plus cash raised from November's sale of 26.2% of its holding in Swedish broker Carnegie, where it owned 30.8%.

Disappointing annual figures and a dividend cut from the Prudential (23 1/4p down at 487p) tripped the Footsie. It fell 47.6 points on profit-taking before closing 27.5 points lower at 4496.8. Wall Street did not help, losing 45 points in the early stages after consumer confidence in the US economy fell to its lowest level since October.

Sterling advanced to $1.891 while the euro firmed to $1.2695. In sterling terms it eased to 67.1p.

The Pru's woeful performance left Friends Provident 5 1/4p down at 147p, Legal & General 3 1/4p easier at 101p, Aviva 13p off at 542 1/2p and Old Mutual 2 1/4p cheaper at 92 1/4p.

Worries that Abbey's full-year results tomorrow will contain a Scottish Mutual life insurance horror story left Abbey a further 7 1/2p down at 555p.

Replacement hip and knee group Smith & Nephew which reported good results, hopped 19 3/4p higher to 528 3/4p on reports of a pending bullish circular.

After receiving planning permission for the regeneration of London's Greenwich Peninsula, including the Dome, property group Quintain Estates rose 11 1/2p to 374 1/2p.

Aim-listed medical devices developer Maelor advanced 3 1/2p to 27p after signing a contract for the distribution of Volpex, its plasma substitute product, in China.

Peter Hambro Mining struck gold with a rise of 21 1/2p to 485p. Numis moved to strong buy and increased its target price to 722p after an upbeat mining report from Pokrovskiy, its Russian operating subsidiary. An independent study has added some 7m ounces of gold to the potential of its licence area.

Dog of the day was CustomVis. It crashed 31 1/2p to 49p on warning that it expects to make only five laser systems in the year, down from the 12 previously expected. Production has been hit by lack of staff and resources.

A profit warning with the full-year results saw shares of Molins which supplies packaging material to the tobacco industry, go up in smoke. They plummeted to 327 1/2p before closing 42 1/2p down at 350p.

DDD Group jumped 4 1/2p to 36 1/2p after receiving further European patent approval for its Dynamic Depth Cueing technology.

Engineer Renold looked a bit rusty at 70 1/2p, down 6 1/2p, after warning that the dollar's demise means its underlying second-half performance is likely to be similar to last year.

Whitbread fell 10p to 757p after warning that growth has slowed with sales up 2.4% and two weeks of its full year to go. David Lloyd gyms were the top performer with sales up 5.8%. Word is that Whitbread is keen to join the £400m auction for Premier Lodge, the budget hotels chain owned by private group Spirit.

NETCALL jumped 2 1/2p to 27 1/2p, recovering some of the ground lost following recent disappointing interims. The Aim-listed supplier of call centre technology was given a new lease of life by news that BT Global Services will offer the QueueBuster call centre solution to its clients. The product will be rebranded BT QueueBuster and revenues will be shared with Netcall.