This year should be extra special as it will be my daughter’s first real experience of Christmas. She was only a couple of months old last December, and so very much a disinterested observer. And she seems to loves her food, especially when we all sit down for a meal together. I must confess, though, we haven’t yet decided whether to feed her sprouts!

Since Bernard Matthews — of ‘Bootiful’ and Turkey Twizzlers fame — is no longer a listed company, I’m going to plump for another food company for my Christmas stock. Well, it’s mostly a consumer products company these days. It’s Unilever (LSE: ULVR) (NYSE: UL.US).

Looking down its list of brands, a lot of them won’t actually get much of a look in as far as Christmas lunch goes. But I suspect the PG Tips will come into play afterwards, as we need soothing beverages while we wash up. And Slim-Fast may even be handy if we overdo it.

But it’s Unilever’s dependability that mostly attracts me. Its dividends aren’t spectacular but have grown nicely over the years, and I like the way it has distanced itself from reporting detailed quarterly profit updates. It’s not had the best 2014, as growth from emerging markets has slowed, but I still like its long-term position. After all, a stock is not just for Christmas!

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Starting the year at 66p, the shares peaked at over 80p in early January, and were at much the same level up until March. But it has been mostly downhill since then, and the shares even touched a low of 26.25p last week. There has been a partial recovery since then, but at 34.5p the shares are down by nearly a half this calendar year.

Monitise, which produces mobile banking solutions, was spun out of Morse (the IT company, not the TV show) in 2007, and it has become a firm bulletin board favourite. However, while Monitise’s revenues have grown strongly each year, the estimated time when it turns profitable has been repeatedly pushed back.

Starting strong

This year actually started pretty well for Monitise. Results for the half year ended 31 December 2013, released in February 2014, showed revenues up 67% and reduced losses.

The following month, a switch to a subscription-based model was announced at the same time as a fundraising at 68p per share. A total of £109m was raised, substantially shoring up the company’s cash balances.

Growth downgraded

The shift from upfront licence revenues to ongoing subscriptions meant revenue growth expectations for the year to 30 June 2014 had to be scaled back from 50% to 40%. And there was a further reduction to 31%-33% in July, which Monitise said was due a faster than expected uptake of the subscription model.

In the end, revenues for the year to 30 June 2014 came in at £95m, representing growth of 31%, i.e. the lower end of forecasts. The  loss for the year was a chunky £60m. However, despite the declining growth forecasts for this year, Monitise is still sticking with its forecast of EBITDA profitability in 2016. It has a cash cushion of nearly £150m to rest upon in the meantime.

One in, one out

The last month has seen one major new partner, IBM, join the Monitise stable, but one long-standing backer, Visa, announce its plans to sell its 5.5% stake while also looking to develop more mobile banking solutions in-house. News of the latter caused Monitise’s share price to fall by a third in one day.

Monitise feels like it is at a crossroads right now. It still commands a valuation of £700m, but I suspect investors will punish it severely if there are any further setbacks regarding its predicted profitability. However, if Monitise’s longer term forecasts for 2018 come to pass, today’s share price could prove an attractive entry point.

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Stuart Watson does not own any share mentioned in this article. The Motley Fool UK owns shares in Monitise. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

Longer-term shareholders might say “it’s about time, too”. Despite doubling over the last two and a bit years, the share price is still at half the level it was back in 2001. Indeed, Aviva has been in turnaround mode for what seems like an eternity.

A good start, but much more to come

The current CEO, Mark Wilson, summed things pretty well earlier this year when Aviva released its 2013 results, saying:

“The turnaround at Aviva is intensifying. We have focused the business on ‘cash flow plus growth’ and the benefits are starting to be reflected in our performance.

Following our exit from a number of low margin, underperforming or non-strategic businesses, Aviva is simpler, more focused and better managed. We have significantly improved our capital surplus, increased our liquidity and have a stronger leadership team.

Although we have made progress, I want to guard against complacency. Aviva still has issues to address. Have we made progress? Yes, some. Is it a little faster than anticipated? Probably. Have we unlocked the full potential at Aviva? Not yet.”

Running up that hill

The streamlining of Aviva has continued in 2014 with disposals in Turkey, South Korea and Spain. The half-year results released in early August even saw a 5% increase in the interim dividend. It’s fair to say that Aviva shareholders haven’t seen the words “increase” and “dividend” in the same sentence very often in recent years.

The improvement in operating profits for the first half of 2014 was fairly small but hard-fought, as Aviva had to face “an overhaul of the UK annuity market, a particularly harsh winter in Canada, UK floods and a stronger Sterling.”

No doubt there will be many more hurdles to overcome before Aviva is back to full strength. The reform of the car insurance market in the UK, announced earlier this week, is a good example of one such potential obstacle. But Aviva has not looked this healthy for many, many years.

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Stuart Watson does not own shares in any company mentioned in this article.

Today JD Sports revealed its interim profits had doubled to £20m, and its shares gained a chunky 8% to 439p. At this level, they are within touching distance of their all-time high of 456p set in May of this year.

Expanding in Europe

The group now has around 900 stories covering sports, fashion and outdoor pursuits. It remains primarily a UK business, but its European revenues grew an impressive 45% over the same period last year, and now account for nearly a fifth of all sales.

Digging into the profit and loss account, we can see gross margins were actually down by over one percentage point on last year at 47.6%. Various factors were at play here, including a change in the sales mix towards footwear and the recent acquisition of a lower-margin business.

However, JD Sports is also benefitting from economies of scale and was able to reduce its selling and distribution costs by much more than the decline in gross margins by, for example, closing a duplicate warehousing facility.

The second-half bias

Investors shouldn’t get too carried away though, as the majority of JD Sports’ profits are earned in the second half of the year. That is perhaps why there was a relatively stingy dividend increase of 3%.

Peter Cowgill, Executive Chairman of JD Sports, commented: “The Board recognises the demanding comparatives of the second half of the last financial year, particularly in the core UK and Ireland Sports fascias where like for like sales increased by 11.2%, as well as our significant dependence on Christmas trading, but following the robust performance of the business in the first half believes that the Group is well positioned to deliver results towards the upper end of current market expectations.”

Analysts had been expecting earnings per share of around 31p for the current year, putting the shares on a forward P/E of 14.

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Stuart Watson has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK has no position in any of the shares mentioned. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

After outlining its proposed dividend policy in a statement a few months ago, Centamin announced a 0.87 cents per share dividend (roughly 0.5p) alongside its interim results this morning. Payable in early October, this represents a total distibution of $10m versus cash and gold on hand of around $130m.

In due course, Centamin has said it “will aim to approve an annual dividend within the range of 15-30% of the Company’s net cash flow after sustaining capital costs and following the payment of Profit Share due to the Government of Egypt.” Centamin reckons no profit share will become due for a couple of years, although it did make a $19m profit share payment last year as a gesture of goodwill.

Production forecast maintained

Other highlights of today’s statement included second-quarter production of 81,281 ounces, which was 9% higher than the first quarter but 13% lower than the same period last year. Nevertheless, Centamin is sticking with its full-year target of 420,000 ounces at a cash cost of $700 per ounce, as it is expecting plant throughput to increase and grades to improve from its underground mine. For next year onwards, the production target is 450,000 to 500,000 ounces. 

Centamin shares were largely unchanged on today’s news, changing hands at 74.5p. However, the shares have more than doubled from their lows of around 30p in early 2013 when there was a legal dispute over its exploration licence. 

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Stuart Watson has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the shares mentioned. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

This morning, following discussions with Balfour Beatty’s major shareholders, Carillion promised an extra dividend should the deal proceed, and also outlined what it thought the potential cost savings could be.

8.5p and more to come…

The additional dividend would be 8.5p per Balfour Beatty share, which is arguably fairly minor compared to the overall scale of the deal. Perhaps more importantly, Carillion said it planned to continue its progressive dividend policy. Carillion’s payout has increased from 13p to 17.5p over the last five years, while Balfour Beatty’s has increased much more slowly, from 12.8p to 14.1p.

On the cost savings front, Carillion reckons that £175m a year could be saved across the group by the end of 2016 by removing duplicate functions and property, and using Carillion’s supply chain solution. The one-off cash costs of these savings would be £225m.

Carillion also reckons the enlarged group would have access to £3bn in funding, and that a further three to four weeks of due diligence would be required once it had access to Balfour Beatty’s books again. However, it clearly intends to retain Balfour’s Parsons Brinckerhoff subsidiary, the fate of which was apparently the main stumbling block when discussions between the two companies were more cordial.

Share price bounce

Investors seemed to like this latest development, with Balfour Beatty rising 2% to 242p and Carillion 4% higher at 333p.

Carillion also issued its half-year results today. These showed a 5% fall in revenues but a 5% increase in profits. The interim dividend was raised just 2% however. The company said it was “well positioned to benefit from its strong work-winning performance over the last 18 months”, and that expectations for full-year profits remained unchanged.

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Stuart Watson has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the shares mentioned. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

Glencore

Copper bottomed

Copper, its major profit source, saw production rise 13% to 741,000 tonnes thanks to a ramp-up at its Mutanda operation and improved production at Collahuasi. Due to the company’s production profile, higher volumes are expected in the second half of the year than the first.

Ferrochrome production was up 16%, but there was less good news when it came to zinc, down 11%, and nickel, 8% lower. Two zinc mines depleted their reserves in June 2013, and some of Glencore’s nickel operations have been placed on care and maintenance.

Energised

On the energy front, coal production was up 5%, but oil production rose 41%, due to two operations only coming on line during 2013.

Glencore also re-confirmed that the sale of its Las Bambas copper mine had been completed, which will net the company a cool $6.5 billion after tax.

All eyes now turn to Glencore’s detailed half-year results, which are due for release a week today. Like many of the major miners, Glencore releases summary production figures first, followed by full financial figures shortly afterwards.

Despite today’s share price slip, Glencore is trading at around its highest level since early 2013. Its forecast P/E and dividend yield are 17 times and 2.8% respectively.

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Stuart Watson has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the shares mentioned. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

What: The share price of Amara Mining (LSE: AMA) rose as much as 14% to 25p in early trading this morning following the announcement of “exceptional drilling results” from its Yaoure Gold Project in Côte d’Ivoire. 

So what: Amara is clearly pleased with these results as it only deemed its two previous drilling announcements to be “encouraging” rather than “exceptional”. Highlights from the today’s results included a couple of particularly high-grade sections: 2m at 45.8 g/t (grams per tonne) and 5m at 17.01 g/t.

All the results from Amara’s recent drilling programme will be used to calculate its first Mineral Resource update, which is due next month. Amara said drilling was likely to continue until early October, so that a second Mineral Resource update could be provided in the final quarter of this year.

The new resource figures will then be plugged into the pre-feasibility study for Yaoure that is being targeted for early 2015. Pre-feasibility is one of the major stages all new mines have to pass through before construction can begin.

Now what: Amara, formerly known as Cluff Gold, reckons the current resource for Yaoure is 6.3 million ounces, and it is hoping the two updates soon to be released will increase both the amount of gold and the grade of the resource.

The preliminary economic assessment of the mine’s prospects was that it may be able to produce 325,000 ounces a year, which would catapult it into the top twelve mines in Africa. It would be a few years before this goal is reached, and the fact that Amara recently had to put its Kalsaka/Sega mine in Burkino Faso into liquidation serves as a stark reminder of the risks investors in this sector face.

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Stuart Watson has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the shares mentioned. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

The trend towards smaller field sizes in horse racing meant there was a 20-year high in the number of favourites winning in the first six months of 2014. That’s good for us punters, but not so good for the likes of Ladbrokes. All in all, favourites have won 37.5% of races so far this year, but the ratio was even higher at the popular flat festivals at Epsom and Ascot.

Ladbrokes has been attempting to address this trend by moving its betting business more towards football, but a series of customer-friendly results, as it calls them, hampered profits there as well. All this misfortune meant a 21% reduction in profits at its core UK retail division in the first half of 2014.

Mobile takes over

In its Digital division, as you might expect, mobile betting is increasingly taking over from desktop betting and now accounts for over half of all staking. Ladbrokes did particularly well from the World Cup, but once again, other unfavourable sporting results conspired to hold back margins in this division.

Despite the customer friendly results helping ordinary punters, High Rollers didn’t join in the fun. Profits made from this group more than trebled to £10.7m, out of total operating profits of £67.5m. Once various exceptional costs and hefty finance expenses are deducted, pre-tax profits for the first six months of 2014 came in at just £27.7m, a little over half of what was achieved last year.

Trouble ahead

Ladbrokes remains relatively upbeat about the second half of 2014, as it believes it has laid solid foundations for future growth. But it will face new regulations on some betting machines, and the new 15% place of consumption tax for online gambling also comes into effect. It’s also clearly concerned about the long-term health of horse racing in the UK.

Ladbrokes half-year dividend is being held at 4.3p, and it remains committed to paying a full-year dividend of at least 8.9p per share. Its shares, up 2% to 133.5p this morning, therefore yield a prospective 6.7%.

Despite today’s little rise, its shares are well down on their recent high of 240p set in early 2013, are at pretty much their lowest level for over 20 years (if the share price chart on its website is accurate).

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Although Schroders is looking to raise its overall payout level, a good portion of this increase represents a rebalancing between the interim and final dividend. So investors certainly shouldn’t expect a similar 50% increase when the final dividend is announced early in 2015.

Assets on the rise

Schroders had plenty of other good news to report today. Underlying profits and assets under management both grew by an impressive 15%. The latter now stands at £271.5 billion and could grow further in the second half of the year, as Schroders said a number of recent institutional client wins had yet to be funded.

The direction of the markets will also have a big impact on this key figure. Markets have certainly been buoyant in the last few years but in a telephone interview with Reuters, Schroders said there was “an uneasy calm” among investors at present. 

Like many companies reporting recently, the strength of sterling was called out as a factor. In Schroders’ case, it knocked an estimated £18m off pre-tax profits of £234m.

Despite the decent results, the brief text surrounding these figures struck a generally cautious tone. That may explain why Schroders’ shares slipped back to 3% to 2,416p this morning. So, with full-year earnings per share expected to be in the region of 160p or so, the shares trade on a forward price-earnings ratio of 15 times.

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Stuart Watson has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the shares mentioned.