Blue chips dip after Draghi decision but AIM stays steady

(MENAFN- ProactiveInvestors - UK) Small-cap stocks failed to move far from their opening level on Thursday on a thin news day for the AIM market.

The FTSE AIM 100 Index rose 3.04 points to 3272 by mid-afternoon although Chariot Oil & Gas Limited (LON:CHAR) and Proxama PLC (LON:PROX) were notable movers.

The blue-chip FTSE 100 Index pared gains to stand 11.74 points adrift at 6134 as investors digested European Central Bank president Mario Draghi's decision to launch more eurozone stimulus.

The ECB decided to cut its bank deposit rate to -0.4% and add 20bn to its monthly quantitative easing programme from April.

Chariot Oil & Gas lifted nearly 6% to 6.5p as the Atlantic margins-focused oil and gas explorer said it had begun a 3D seismic acquisition survey covering its licences in theBarreirinhas basin offshore Brazil.

Mobile marketing group Proxama ticked up 23.3% to 1.32p as investors continued to applaud the company's new partnership with Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) owned by Alphabet Inc.

Sareum Holdings Plc (LON:SAR) bounced 16.7% to 0.63p although the specialist cancer drug discovery and development business said it did not know why.

Attraqt Group PLC (LON:ATQT) went the other way by a similar percentage standing 7.5p down at 37p as investors took stock after thee-commerce and visual merchandising specialist's results on Wednesday.

Also among the risers was US-focused onshore group Magnolia Petroleum PLC (LON:MAGP) which specializes in taking small stakes in producing fields which told investors that two wells drilled by Chesapeake Energy in Oklahoma's Mississippi Lime play have now begun producing the black stuff.

The first well tagged Gray 7-27-12 1H had an initial production rate of 1056 barrels of oil equivalent per day while the second tagged Gray 7-27-12 2H yielded 952 boepd. Shares added over 3% to stand at 0.19p.

Alaska-focused 88Energy (LON:88E) added more than 26% to 3.75p as its good run continues after positive initial findings from the Icewine exploration well.

Hydrodec Group PLC (LON:HYR) shares added 4.1% to 3.51p as it revealed the US plant it developed to process and recycle waste oil from transformers achieved a new daily record last month.

On February 29 the operation in Canton Ohio shipped 378000 litres of its Superfine product to customers.

One of the best risers in London was West African Minerals (LON:WAFM) up nearly 20% at 2.8p in the wake of a price lift in iron ore.

LONDON OPEN

A bounce in the price of crude helped along small oil stocks today and junior resource shares were also in favour but the main indices didn't move much.

Among the risers was US-focused onshore group Magnolia Petroleum PLC (LON:MAGP) which specializes in taking small stakes in producing fields which told investors that two wells drilled by Chesapeake Energy in Oklahoma's Mississippi Lime play have now begun producing the black stuff.

The first well tagged Gray 7-27-12 1H had an initial production rate of 1056 barrels of oil equivalent per day while the second tagged Gray 7-27-12 2H yielded 952 boepd. Shares added over 11% to stand at 0.20p.

Also up today was Alaska focused 88Energy (LON:88E) which added over 10% to 3.30p as its good run continues after positive initial findings from the Icewine exploration well.

Hydrodec Group PLC (LON:HYR) shares added 7.41% to 3.63p as it revealed the US plant it developed to process and recycle waste oil from transformers achieved a new daily record last month.

On February 29 the operation in Canton Ohio shipped 378000 litres of its Superfine product to customers.

One of the best risers in London was West African Minerals (LON:WAFM) up over 26% at 3p in the wake of a price lift in iron ore.

The main small cap indices were up a shade with FTSE AIM 100 ahead by 0.09% at 3217 and FTSEAIM All share 0.15% to the good at 700.4.

On the blue chip side FTSE100 was going the other direction down 1.18 points at the time of writing as traders are not sure which way to turn ahead of the ECB police announcement out at around lunchtime.

Aviva the insurer was the big gainer adding over 5% to 482.7p as it unveiled a 20% increase in operating profits thanks to contribution from new acquisition Friends Life.

The purchase completed in April last year boosted the life businesses' operating profit by 358 million to 1.4bn.

In contrast to the Aviva news The biggest laggard on Footsie was insurer Direct Line (LON:DLG) which fell over 6% to 370.2p as it was one of several firms going ex-dividend.