Online dating firm Cupid (LON:CUP) has suffered the slings and arrows of erroneous allegations, but it is in good heart today.
An independent review ordered by the company cleared it of the most damaging allegation, namely that it created fake profiles on its sites to encourage new customer to sign up.
The report did conclude, however, that Cupid staff that were using their firm’s own site to find a sweetheart should have been clearly identified as such.
Unscrupulous individuals using Cupid’s site to run scams were identified as an area of concern, but the report noted that this is an industry wide problem and that Cupid is expending significant time and energy to combat it.
Internet users made the results of the independent review the hottest news item of the morning. The shares also proved popular, up 7.9% at 77.7p.
Meanwhile, the owner of the most popular newspaper web site in the world, the Daily Mail and General Trust (LON:DMGT), revealed that Rothermere Continuation is contemplating buying out all the remaining holders of the ordinary voting shares, after the Viscount Rothermere’s family trust increased its stake in the ordinary share capital to 89.2% from 59.9%.
The increase in the stake came about after the Esmond Harmsworth Settlement agreed to exchange Rothermere its ordinary voting shares for ‘A’ class non-voting shares, on the basis of 112.5 ‘A’ shares for every 100 ordinary shares.
Although the Rothermere Continuation trust is under no obligation to buy out the remaining 10.8% of the ordinary voting shares, it has been talking to the Daily Mail’s independent directors about the possibility of making a buy-out on the same terms offered to Harmsworth.
In the always keenly followed resources sector, Nostra Terra Oil & Gas (LON:NTOG) is currently the stock du jour after the company did a bit of tidying up, acquiring interests in assets that it is already operating on in Kansas.
The situation is a bit complicated, but basically the story is: Nostra Terra issued a loan note to a company called Richfield Oil & Gas that was never paid back; in order to get its money back, Nostra Terra succeeded in getting a US court to put Richfield’s assets up for sale, via auction; Nostra Terra then won the auction for those assets.
The company is paying US$165,000 for two producing oil wells, their associated production equipment, facilities and leases, along with a common salt water disposal well. Current production on these leases averages around six barrels of production per day (gross).
Matt Lofgran, chief executive officer of Nostra Terra, commented: "We're delighted with this outcome. We've acquired producing assets, which we already operate, to add to our growing portfolio, increasing both cash flow and reserves."
The subject of natural gas is trending on Google after the Indian government doubled the price for natural gas. Deutsche Bank reckons this will deliver a US$450mln windfall a year to BP (LON:BP.).
In the longer term the government’s decision will also boost BP’s growth plans in the country, where it has an estimated 4trn cubic feet of gas via its partnership with Reliance, the German bank said.
Also hitting the headlines on Google’s news service is renewable energy, following the release of some research from Nottingham Trent University that farmers don’t feel the potential for on-farm renewable energy is being met.
Almost 40% of those who participated in the survey are now using renewables, and of those who are not, 61% indicated they are likely to invest in energy generation in the next five years.
It looks like it will be a while before Farmer Giles becomes a threat to the likes of UK & Ireland biomass burners Kedco (LON:KED).
Results from “big data” specialist 1data (LON:SPA) have put the company on the map, but for all the wrong reasons. The shares went subterranean after losses for the year ballooned to £4.4mln from a loss of £1.4mln the year before.
“Big data” is a software buzz-phrase, and refers to the ability to quickly make sense of the information overload the world is currently experiencing.
Investors seemed to parse the data in 1spatial’s results fairly quickly; the shares tumbled 10% to 7.3p.