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Melrose Industries CFO to step down, Hunting subsidiary makes 'geographical breakthrough' into South America
By Iain Gilbert
Date: Monday 01 Dec 2025
(Sharecast News) - LONDON PRE-OPEN
The FTSE 100 was expected to open 13.1 points lower ahead of the bell on Monday after wrapping up the previous session 0.27% firmer at 9,720.51.
STOCKS TO WATCH
Budget airlines easyJet and Wizz said they had completed software upgrades to their fleets of Airbus A320 planes over the weekend without any cancellations after a warning from the manufacturer on Friday that solar radiation could interfere with onboard computers. Easyjet added that its financial outlook remained unchanged.
Matthew Gregory, chief financial officer of Melrose Industries, will step down from the role, the blue chip aerospace firm announced on Monday. Gregory, 56, has informed the board that he plans to retire in 2026, two years after taking up the job. He will be replaced by Ross McCluskey, a vice president at testing and inspection specialist Intertek Group.
Precision engineering group Hunting's Hunting Energy Services Production Technology subsidiary has won its first sampling and testing contract in Brazil. Hunting said the deal marks a strategic breakthrough into South America for its Oil Optimisation and Recovery technology, and was the first new territory entered since buying the business in March 2025.
NEWSPAPER ROUND-UP
Shoppers held back from visiting high streets over Black Friday, data shows, amid fears weak consumer spending will put the brakes on economic growth in 2026. Visitors to all UK shopping destinations were down 2% on Friday and 7.2% compared with the equivalent days last year, according to the monitoring company MRI Software, with locations near central London offices among the few to experience a lift in visits. - Guardian
The upmarket bakery chain Gail's is planning 40 more outlets after sales rose by a fifth last year as it opened 36 new bakeries and sales to supermarkets increased. The cafe and retailer, which currently has 185 sites, said sales rose to £278m in the year to the end of February but that pre-tax losses widened to £7.8m, from £7.4m a year before, as costs rose and it spent millions on opening new outlets, according to accounts filed at Companies House. - Guardian
Britain's worst parcel delivery company paid out a £108m dividend last year, just months after it was bought by US private equity giant Apollo. Evri, which was named the UK's worst courier for the third year running by the regulator Ofcom last month, paid the money into its parent company in the year to March. - Telegraph
Amazon is scaling back its British drone delivery plans after the tech giant had its wings clipped by local planning officers. The internet retailer has cut back the frequency of planned drone flights by more than half as it waits for approval to launch Britain's first drone deliveries next month. - Telegraph
The High Court is due to hear claims that Lloyds Banking Group should pay £280m for alleged failings in relation to a £1.2bn scam. Lloyds and Bank of Scotland are accused of breaching banking mandates and duties of care by processing fraudulent payment instructions related to Arena, a television equipment business at the centre of what is purported to be Britain's "largest ever" asset-based lending fraud. - The Times
Google's move into its London "landscraper" has been pushed back until next year, The Times understands. Repeated delays to the works mean that teams will not start taking residence in the US tech company's massive £1bn European headquarters, known as Platform G, until some point in 2026. Google did not respond to requests for comment. - The Times
US CLOSE
US stocks closed higher on Friday in a shortened post‑Thanksgiving session, shrugging off disruption at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.61% at 47,716.42, while the S&P 500 gained 0.54% to 6,849.09 and the Nasdaq Composite finished 0.65% stronger at 23,365.69.
Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com
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