SMALL CAP MOVERS: N Brown, RWS Holdings

The political unrest in Peru has so far largely failed to make it into the news pages of the British media.

But for PetroTal and its investors, it’s a flammable and very expensive reality.

Shares of the company, which operates in the country’s northeast, fell 9 percent after an illegal and violent river blockade stopped ships servicing its operations.

PetroTal said the Indigenous Association for Development and Conservation of Bajo Puinahua initiated the blockade last week.

The disruption coincided with planned production cuts, allowing PetroTal to connect existing infrastructure and make adjustments for future oil production.

As a result, the field will be shut down for five days, which began on June 8, which will affect oil production forecasts for the year.

In the broader market, the AIM All-Share Index was mostly flat, falling 0.03 percent to 790.25 points in the first week of June.

Elsewhere, the FTSE 100 finished 0.2 percent lower last week to 7,593, while the FTSE 250 lost about 0.4 percent to 19,075.

Sticking to oil players, and IOG fell 45 percent to 3.6 pence after it revealed a potential downhole mechanical blockage found during well cleanup and testing of the Blythe H2 well in the southern North Sea. The output remains below the initial gas flow rate.

During a bad news week for junior oilers, Barryroe offshore energy fell more than 79 percent to 0.24 pence as the Irish group abandoned plans for the previously announced capital raise, which would have resulted in a €20 million capital injection.

Now unsure of his financial future, Barryroe chose to reach out to his larger shareholders in an effort to secure the necessary working capital.

Clean Power Hydrogen‘s investors weren’t too happy about the termination of its license deal with GHFG for breach of contract, with shares falling 14 percent to 22.5 pence last week.

Beleaguered shopkeeper N Brown was unable to stem the rot after suggesting “weaker confidence” could continue to weigh on performance, sending shares down 11 percent to 24.8 pence.

On some risers, and one of London’s biggest movers was last week Amigo Holdingswhich more than doubled to 0.69p.

The lender confirmed that it began an orderly, solvent run-down of its operations in March.

Also making positive price movements was Barkbythe diversified group of high-growth and quality companies.

Barkby gained 27 percent to 4.2 pence after its subsidiary, Cambridge Sleep Sciences, was awarded a five-year global license to produce a “Smart Pillow.”

Gama Aviation rose higher after it reported strong earnings cash flow on the back of significant growth and improved profitability at its US maintenance and repair business, Jet East.

Underlying group profit nearly doubled to $22.9 million, while revenue rose 21 percent to $285.6 million, pushing shares up 4 percent to 53.9 pence

Shares in mining company Premier African Minerals shone, gaining 32 percent to 0.82p after confirming it is in advanced discussions to add additional material to its agreement with Canmax Technologies.

The two are about to agree on a settlement whereby both parties will equally share revenue from the sale of lithium hydroxide produced from Premier-supplied spodumene.

Canmax, which sells and produces new energy materials, also confirmed that it has no plans to exit the existing agreement.

It’s been a good week before RWS Holdingsthe language translation specialist, jumped more than 10 per cent to 258p after announcing plans to return £50 million to shareholders via a buyback.

The AIM-listed company, which broke a market cap of £1 billion following the announcement, also stuck to its full-year forecast of £747 million in revenue and £126 million in pre-tax profit.

Finally, are we witnessing signs of life in the capital markets?

The answer could be affirmative. A number of large-cap IPOs have surfaced, including the FTSE 100-bound WE Soda.

Among the minnows, new listings are starting to be announced and about 20 secondary fundraisers have taken place in the past month. However, the funds involved in these latter cases were negligible.

The average hovered around £2 million, with exactly half of the companies raising less than £1 million, which in market parlance is just enough to keep the lights on.

However, we noticed a similar trend from the end of January, with the amounts raised gradually increasing in line with confidence.

This trend continued until mid-March, when Silicon Valley Bank, a lender to thousands of high-tech and high-growth companies, collapsed, sending sentiment into a frenzy and small-cap investors scrambling for cover.

Sources within the London corporate brokerage community suggest there may be a short-lived renaissance in the fortunes of secondary and primary markets – however, this resurgence is expected to be short-lived as we enter the slow days of summer.

What happens when everyone returns from vacation in September probably depends largely on the decisions of the central banks, as well as on the actions of Messrs. Putin and Zelensky.

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