Below is a selection of the morning's key market news, earning reports & trending stories - see more here.
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Playtech (PTEC) this morning announced it has sold its entire holding in Plus500 (PLUS) .
The company has offloaded 11.5m ordinary shares at a price of 1,550p per ordinary share, totalling £176m.
Playtech said the proceeds from the sale will be used for general corporate purposes and debt reduction, but will not impact Playtech's entitlement to the $16.6m Plus500 interim dividend.
The stake represents approximately 9.99% of Plus500's issued share capital and after the completion of the sale, Playtech will no longer hold any interest in Plus500's shares.
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High streets in the UK had their worst performance in August in three years.
Underlying sales fell by 2.7% last month compared to the year before, in what was one of the worst Augusts since records began in 2006.
The fashion sector was particularly hit, having its worst August since 2015 - in-store sales down in every week of August.
Sophie Michael, head of retail and wholesale at BDO LLP, said: "With inflation continuing to bite on the weekly shop and the heatwave driving discretionary spending to bars and entertaining, there is even less disposable income heading to the high street.
"There are signs that retailer margins are being protected through tighter management of stock levels and shortening discount periods.
"However, next month is going to be an important bellwether for retailers leading into the crucial last quarter of the calendar year.”
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AstraZeneca (AZN) has been granted a priority review by the FDA for its severe asthma treatment.
The asthma treatment, called tezepelumab, is made by partner Amgen and has been given AstraZeneca’s first Breakthrough Therapy Designation for a respiratory medicine.
Chief Medical Officer Sean Bohen said: “Tezepelumab is exciting because it has the potential to treat a broad population of severe asthma patients, including those ineligible for currently-approved biologic therapies.
“The breakthrough therapy designation will help us bring tezepelumab to patients as quickly as possible.”
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Good weather and the World Cup boosted Greene King’s (GKN) sales over the summer.
In a trading statement, the pub group announced like-for-like sales were up 2.8% for the first 18 weeks of the year, and growth was up 3.2% over the last 10 weeks.
The company also said that 3.7m pints of beer were sold during England’s seven World Cup matches.
Greene King said: “We continue to focus on profitably driving top line growth, developing a more streamlined and efficient organisation and further strengthening our capital structure to deliver long-term value creation for our shareholders.”
