We’ve had a few quiet weeks for scheduled company news, with not many companies reporting results or bringing us trading updates in June. But as we move into July, things will start to get busier again. And though we don’t have any FTSE 100 results coming our way next week, we will have updates from three members of the UK’s top index:
Persimmon, Tuesday 2 July
Housebuilder Persimmon (LSE: PSN) celebrated its promotion to the top-flight FTSE 100 this month, after its share price has doubled over the past 12 months to 1,168p. We’ll have a trading update from the company next Tuesday, which will hopefully build on April’s interim update, which told us of a good start to 2013 with visitor levels up 5% in the first 15 weeks.
Analysts are forecasting a 20% rise in earnings per share for the full year to December, putting the shares on a forward price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of nearly 17. That’s a bit ahead of the FTSE forward average of 14, but estimates for 2014 bring it down to around 13.5.
All this is good news for the Fool’s Beginners’ Portfolio, which added Persimmon shares in July last year at 618p per share — we’re up 88% since then.
Tullow Oil, Wednesday 3 July
We’ll have a first-half trading statement and operational update from Tullow Oil (LSE: TLW) on Wednesday, ahead of interim results on 31 July. And with the share price down nearly 30% over the past 12 months to 1,021p, some good news would not go amiss.
The company’s last interim update on 8 May was generally positive, with performance in line with expectations so far. The rest of the year’s exploration programme looks busy with the firm telling us that “Tullow is well placed for the rest of the year and into 2014“.
There is only a modest rise in earnings per share forecast for the full year to December, but with the shares valued on a forward P/E mutiple of 22, there are clearly some good years ahead expected.
easyJet, Thursday 4 July
Thursday will bring us passenger statistics for June from easyJet (LSE: EZJ), ahead of a third-quarter statement due on 24 July, and we should probably expect to see further boosts on top of May’s increase as the summer season progresses.
The budget airline is very much in favour with investors at the moment, with its share price up around 140% over the past year to today’s 1,273p — and the firm’s recent plans to substantially revamp its fleet bode well for the future.
After the share price rise, easyJet is still on a forward P/E of only 15 based on current consensus forecasts, which is perhaps not excessive for a company with strong growth prospects — but against that we must set the risks faced by all players in the intensely competitive airline business.
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> Alan does not own any shares mentioned in this article.
