Small-cap Week, April 4

Investment group Dunedin Enterprise reported this week that it had injected £5m into Blackrock Programme Management, whose international projects include infrastructure such as airports, roads and power stations.

The business recorded turnover of £10m last year, and has grown tenfold in the past four years. Dunedin said that it expected "further significant growth" this year. Shares in Dunedin rose 2.6 per cent over the week to 339.6p.

Churchill Mining fell 19.2 per cent to 10.5p this week after losses deepened in the first half of its financial year, while it expected a court case in Indonesia over mining licences to linger on for months.

Churchill reported a loss of $1.06m in the six months to the end of December, after a loss of £900,000 in the same period a year ago, with foreign exchange headwinds having a negative impact as the pound and the Australian dollar weakened against the US dollar.

DDD, the 3D software and hardware supplier, had a lively week after nearly tripling its share price following Monday's share placement, then losing more than half the next day as investors took profits. The £450,000 cash call was to raise funds for business development and licensing in the coming year. Over the week, the shares were up 46 per cent to 2.375p.

Online fashion retailer Asos gained 8.1 per cent this week to £37.64 after its better than expected first-half results impressed Numis. The broker said that Asos was "back on the front foot" as it reiterated its "buy" rating and £40 price target.

E-Therapeutics bullish despite growing losses

Higher research spending reduced e-Therapeutics' cash balance by more than £9m and its pre-tax loss increased more than 50 per cent to £9.8m in the full year to January 31, writes Chris Tighe.

But the group, which is trying to pioneer a new approach to drug discovery and development, said it still has £33.8m on hand to fund its process, known as network pharmacology. The group says it achieved a "dramatic" acceleration last year in the process of molecule selection - the first stage in developing a new, fully licensed drug.

Essentially, e-Therapeutics applies network analysis to determine which proteins are most critical in any disease, and then seeks to identify molecules capable of targeting that set of proteins.

The group said that its processing reached speeds 100 times faster than two years ago, and that it was encouraged by the "hit rate" of active compounds identified by its discovery process and by their potency.

Chief executive Malcolm Young has described this sector's timescales as "glacial".

LED slides after changes to Shenzhen rice deal

Shares in UK-listed LED International, a Hong Kong provider of energy-efficient lighting, fell 30 per cent this week after local government rules preventing overseas investment in sensitive industries forced it to change plans to take over a Shenzhen rice distributor, writes Conor Sullivan.

The deal was announced in December and would have seen LED buy Shenzhen Ruihetai for up to £1.1m, funded by a share sale and convertible loan notes. The transaction was classed as a reverse takeover under Aim rules and meant that the shares were suspended and remained so until Tuesday.

LED had intended to make the purchase via a "variable interest entity", but in January Beijing announced a review of its rules in this area that meant that the deal could be "retrospectively invalidated" in the future.

On Tuesday LED said it had instead formed a joint venture and will lend the new entity Rmb50m (£6m). LED will own 99 per cent of the venture and the owners of Ruihetai will get 1 per cent.

Over the next three years, the owners of Ruihetai are set to receive newly issued shares in LED worth up to 11.8 per cent of the total.

Parkmead positioned to ride out sector squeeze

Parkmead Group's shares jumped 4 per cent on Monday morning, before closing 1 per cent higher, when the North Sea oil and gas group said it hoped to take advantage of the collapse in crude prices to snap up cheap assets, writes Michael Kavanagh.

In its half-year results, the company reported that its revenues had edged up to $10.1m in the six months to December, after investment to boost output.

However, non-cash impairments of £12.9m, relating to the impact of lower oil prices on its Athena field, pushed Parkmead to a £17m pre-tax loss.

Nevertheless, the group, created and led by former Dana Petroleum chief executive Tom Cross, insisted that it was "evaluating further acquisition opportunities to take advantage of the current low oil price environment".

With cash balances of close to £40m, the company is better positioned to ride out the squeeze on smaller oil companies than other Aim-quoted peers.

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