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Among its fascinating ‘key recommendations’ for the year ahead, City broker T&G said ‘the London equity market is showing remarkable strength at the start of 2006’.
Furthermore, the fourth phase of the current bull market is developing ‘as expected, with rumours of high levels of mergers and acquisitions developing in the background, along with continued buying of successful sectors’. T&G argues the UK share market remains attractive for ‘over-weighting on a global basis’, and stock picking opportunities abound.

‘Fundamental recommendations’, on which T&G takes a bullish stance, include AIM online gaming behemoth Sportingbet, financial news giant Reuters, as well as house builder Bellway, European Goldfields, Expro Group and AIM-listed software provider CODASciSys. This last stock ‘looks too cheap in the face of an improving trading profile’.

‘Sells’ are the order of the day for Electrocomponents, Capital Radio outfit GCap Media and beleaguered supermarket giant Morrisons, which has struggled to break upwards out of a severe down-trend that has depressed its shares for almost two years following the Safeway deal.

T&G advises clients to off-load mid-250 retailer Matalan, as well as fellow second liner Michael Page International, the global specialist recruiter led by Terry Benson that flourished in 2005.