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>> Bloomberg Audio Studios. Podcasts,

radio, news.

The Stock Movers Report, your roundup of

companies making moves in the stock

market, harnessing the power of

Bloomberg data. Well, let's take a look

[music] at some stocks on the move today

in Europe. I'm Stephen Carroll and I'm

joined by Bloomberg reporter Chloe

Melas. Chloe, good morning. [music]

Let's start with some news from AB

Foods, a company name we've often

flagged as somewhat illogical and it's

about to become a little bit more

logical. Yeah, absolutely. So, there's a

couple of things from AB Foods to flag

this morning. So, first of all, it

mentioned quite a lot of weakness across

the board. So, it downgraded

expectations for its sugar business and

they also said that it's its fashion

arm, Primark, had experienced softer

trading in April because

of the Middle East conflict really

hitting that consumer confidence. So,

that has led the shares weaker this

morning, but the bigger update and what

you were hinting at is that the company

is going ahead with the separation of

Primark from its food operations. So,

this is a demerger that is set to

complete by the end of 2027 and it will

result in those two entities being

listed separately on the London Stock

Exchange. So, that is a really massive

change in the history of the group. It's

a breakup of one of the UK's biggest

conglomerate and it is a plan that was

first announced as a possibility back in

November because Primark had just grown

so much and so

now we've all those two separate

businesses and they will face really

different challenges. We've got those

inflationary pressures that will be a

big challenge for the food business and

then for the Primark business, there's

weak consumer confidence that obviously

Primark had Well, AB Foods had already

flagged, but then there's also this

rising competition from online rivals

like Shein as well. So, that's going to

be a bit of a problem as well, but we

have the shares weaker this morning,

though that is mostly in reaction,

according to analysts, to that weaker

sugar business and weaker Primark sales

as well.

Okay, so that's for AB Foods and their

shares down 4.3% in London. Another

share that's dropping sharply this

morning, the UK home builder Crest

Nicholson. What's going on? Yeah, really

massive guidance cut Crest Nicholson and

they said that it was due to economic

uncertainties. So, saying essentially

that buyers were were being deterred by

interest rates still being quite high

and then of course the macroeconomic

backdrop that has led to a deteriorating

consumer confidence. That has meant a

fewer land sales and that has forced

Crest Nicholson to prioritize cash

preservation. And so, this profit

warning has led the shares down

massively this morning, really

plummeting and also dragging the rest of

the UK home builders lower. So, we've

got the likes of Barratt, Redrow, Taylor

Wimpey, Persimmon, all of those names in

the red as well today. So, for Crest

Nicholson specifically, it means a lot

of pain this year, but then potentially

that is necessary to get back on track.

So, for example, RBC analysts have said

that they they have made a decision to

play the long game and that this would

have really hit profit this year, but

that they essentially agree with the

decision not to sell land at sub-optimal

prices and to kind of wait it out. So,

the guidance cut is going to put a lot

of pressure on the company right now,

but we'll see if this was actually a

good a good decision to kind of get back

on track later. Okay, well, let's go to

an energy company next. SSE, what's the

news from them? Yeah, well, the

renewable sector in the UK is fittingly

in in the green today.

That's because the UK is set to be

speeding up efforts to cut the costs of

green electricity by essentially

reducing its exposure to more expensive

gas and de-linking gas and power prices.

So, what that actually means is that the

UK will, for example, offer new

voluntary subsidies for older wind and

solar farms and encourage them to move

to cheaper fixed contracts. So, of

course that is very relevant moment

given that gas costs have been rising

very sharply because of the conflict in

Iran and therefore the government is

under a lot of pressure to reduce bills

for consumers. So, all of that could be

good news for us and for our energy

bills, but it's also good news for some

of those renewable names in the UK. So,

we've got SSE [music] and Centrica, for

example, higher this morning on the back

of that. The Stock [music] Movers Report

from Bloomberg Radio. Check back with us

throughout the day for the latest

roundup of companies [music] making news

on Wall Street. And for the latest

market-moving headlines,

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