FTSE 250 movers: Ocado surges on tie-up news; bookies slump

London's FTSE 250 was up 0.1% to 20,666.65 in afternoon trade on Monday, with Ocado putting in an impressive performance.

Ocado surged after signing its second major international customer less than two months after the first, with a contract to build a customer fulfilment centre for Canada's second largest supermarket group.

Dixons Carphone rallied. Although the company narrowed its full-year profit guidance, investors welcomed the appointment of Alex Baldock as its new chief executive and a 4% year-on-year jump in group revenue for the 10 weeks to 6 January.

The company said it now expects to deliver full-year pre-tax profit of between £365m and £385m, down from previous guidance of between £360m and £400m.

Aveva advanced as the company updated the market on its trading for the nine months to 31 December, saying it performed "strongly", with the improving growth trend seen in the first half continuing into the third quarter.

Indivior received a shot in the arm after news emerged over the weekend that a rival had hit a regulatory hurdle.

Pagegroup was boosted by an upgrade to 'outperform' from 'sector perform' at RBC Capital Markets, which lifted its price target on the stock to 640p from 490p, saying it "looks the best staffing play at this point".

Going the other way, bookies William Hill, Ladbrokes and GVC Holdings were all sharply lower following reports over the weekend that the UK is set to announce a new £2 maximum stake on high stakes gaming machines.

IMI fell after it said that Peter Spencer, the managing director of its IMI Hydronic Engineering, was leaving the group.

Risers

Ocado Group (OCDO) 492.80p 19.32%
Dixons Carphone (DC.) 200.80p 6.84%
Aveva Group (AVV) 3,034.00p 4.55%
Indivior (INDV) 419.10p 4.51%
Brown (N.) Group (BWNG) 280.00p 3.93%
Dignity (DTY) 995.00p 3.43%
Pagegroup (PAGE) 550.00p 3.38%
Vietnam Enterprise Investments (DI) (VEIL) 489.70p 3.31%
AA (AA.) 156.20p 3.31%
Euromoney Institutional Investor (ERM) 1,202.00p 3.09%

Fallers

William Hill (WMH) 294.30p -12.49%
Ladbrokes Coral Group (LCL) 165.40p -9.35%
IMI (IMI) 1,361.50p -3.23%
Hochschild Mining (HOC) 238.10p -2.78%
Meggitt (MGGT) 474.80p -2.70%
GVC Holdings (GVC) 913.00p -2.67%
Cobham (COB) 132.15p -2.44%
Intermediate Capital Group (ICP) 1,101.00p -1.87%
Moneysupermarket.com Group (MONY) 339.00p -1.85%
Drax Group (DRX) 276.80p -1.84%