Thistle soars on buyout speculation

THISTLE Hotels' shares soared by 23.8% last week after it confirmed that it had received several approaches from buyout contenders.

It is understood that Stakis has dropped its talks with Vaux, owner of Swallow Hotels, and is now seeking a US partner to launch a bid for Thistle. One possibility is Strategic Hotel Capital, which paid Stakis £48m for the St Ermin hotel in March.

Stakis shares jumped by 4.53% while Vaux's share value took an 8.26% dive.

World Cup fever hit share values this week. Queen's Moat Houses, with 2,000 of its 18,000 rooms in France, went up by 15.6%. Ladbroke, thanks to its betting interests, gained by 6.3%.

There were no major announcements at Granada's interim results this week and, despite profits being up by 25%, shares dipped by 6.3%.

But robust annual results from Jarvis Hotels last week helped a 7.6% rise to 190p.