Albemarle and Bond Holdings (ABM, 285.0p, £158.17m) In the first four months of the current financial year, demand for small flexible loans at competitive rates remains strong. The group is currently trading in line with FY expectations. Store expansion is on track to open 25 new stores in FY2011, of which 16 will be in H1 2011. The new stores will provide the underpinning for future profit growth.  A good performance has been driven by a positive start to the pledge book and gold buying, helping to establish new customer bases in new locations. Eight new gold buying shops have opened, bringing the total to 27. With gold prices at an all time high, we believe demand for the group’s  gold purchasing service will continue to remain strong, especially ahead of Christmas. The market forecasts 2011 PBT of £19.9m, EPS of 25.62p and DPS of 12.25p. The stock trades on a 2011 prospective PER of 11.1x, a premium to H&T, given its more mature estate. The historic yield of 4.3% encourages us to reiterate our BUY recommendation.   

Arena Leisure (LON:ARE) (ARE, 31.0p, £112.90m), UK’s leading operator of horseracing fixtures, reports an IMS for the period 1 July 2010 to 11 November 2010. The group reports an improvement in public attendances, up by 7,000 to 574,000 and a modest recovery in the hospitality business. As previously noted, a reduction in industry funding from the Horserace Betting Levy will have an adverse impact on profitability. However the degree of the impact in 2011 is unknown. During the period, the group staged 97 fixtures, a total of 285 fixtures by the end of October 2011 (2009: 303), with 353 fixtures anticipate by the year end (2009: 370). The Lingfield Park hotel made a good start to trading through the summer but a softening of the market in recent months has impacted trading and it is anticipated that this will be the case at least for the remainder of the year. The group are cautious about the remainder of the year. There are no update forecasts in the market post the announcement reduction of the levy funding. We were sellers of stock, with a target price of 30p. The stock is now approaching our target price but the uncertainty surrounding 2011 encourages us to reiterate our SELL recommendation and reduce our target price to 25p.…

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