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A fintech company will replace its boss less than a year after its disastrous IPO.
CAB Payments listed with a price tag of £850m in July, but has since seen around £600m lose its value.
And now CEO Bhairav Trivedi, who has been at the helm since January 2021, will step down from his role following the company’s annual results on March 26.
His successor, Neeraj Kapur, previously worked as head of finance at London-listed Vanquis Banking Group (up 0.3 per cent, or 0.4 pence, to 132 pence).
While Trivedi will take on the role of senior advisor to CAB, his departure as CEO comes after a turbulent time for the company. Shares in CAB Payments, which helps its clients move money in emerging markets such as Bangladesh, Cameroon and Senegal, plunged by almost three-quarters in a single session in October last year after a sharp profit warning.
Disastrous float: CAB Payments listed with a price tag of £850m in July but has since seen its value wiped by around £600m
The stock, which floated at 335p, fell 2.6 per cent, or 2.6p, to 99.4p. It is valued at just under £260m. In the broader market, the FTSE 100 gained 0.3 per cent, or 21.79 points, to 7,706.28 and the FTSE 250 lost 0.4 per cent, or 83.94 points, to 19,179.56.
Across the Atlantic, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.3 percent in early trading and the S&P 500 rose 0.1 percent. But the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 0.06 percent.
Nvidia shares rose another 1.6 percent, after rising 16 percent in the previous session.
The chipmaker saw its market capitalization gain £214 billion on Thursday following excellent results. It was the largest one-day increase in market value ever recorded.
Back in London, Bytes Technology published details about shares traded by its boss that it has not disclosed since the IT software company went public in December 2020. Neil Murphy, who joined the company as sales director at 1997, resigned Wednesday and told the board about his dealings.
The disclosure revealed that an undisclosed 313,741 shares were bought at 479.23p each and the same amount sold at 483.46p. The shares fell 2.4 per cent, or 13p, to 532.5p.
WPP had little respite after the advertising giant lost the trust of a City broker.
Morgan Stanley downgraded its stock a day after the company posted a huge drop in profits as Big Tech cut its advertising. On Thursday, WPP said profits for 2023 reached £346 million, down 70 percent from a year earlier. The shares fell 0.1 per cent, or 0.6p, to 730p.
Domino’s Pizza also received a downgrade in its brokerage rating. Barclays expressed concern that a slowdown in app downloads, according to figures from industry tracker Apptopia, could hit sales.
Nearly 80 percent of Domino’s online orders during the third quarter were placed through its app. The shares fell 4.3 per cent, or 15.6p, to 351.6p.
Biotech company PureTech Health went in the opposite direction after the company it founded remained on track to be bought by US pharmaceutical giant Bristol Myers Squibb for $14 billion in the first half of this year.
Karuna Therapeutics, which is developing a treatment for adults with schizophrenia that is under review by the US regulator, agreed to the acquisition in December 2023.
PureTech Health shares rose 11.6 per cent, or 22.1 pence, to 213.5 pence.
Gas and electricity supplier Yu Group has shored up its finances by agreeing a five-year hedging deal with Shell Energy.
The utility, which also installs smart meters for UK businesses, has been hit by volatile energy prices. Yu’s deal with Shell Energy frees up more than £50m in cash that had been placed on its balance sheet as collateral. The shares soared 12.1 per cent, or 140 pence, to 1,300 pence.