Land of Leather lost another 4p to 60p after the furniture retailer revealed that like-for-like sales fell 22 per cent in November, December and January, with a 15 per cent drop in January.

Volex Group, the electrical and electronic cable assemblies supplier, rebounded 17½p to 107p after its profit warning on Monday.

Surface Transforms jumped 2½p to 16p after the maker of carbon-fibre ceramics for cars and aircraft announced reduced losses and said that turnover for the year should be up on the previous year.

Coda rose 17p to 200¾p after agreeing a 205p a share bid from Unit 4 Agresso, a Dutch rival. When the talks were revealed last week, Panmure Gordon described the offer as “stingy” and said that it paved the way for a competing bid. It held to this view yesterday, but Unit 4 has acceptances from just over 50 per cent of shareholders.

Antonov, the maker of automotive gear systems, added 1½p to 34½p after saying that delayed payments from its German distributor were now being received. Plexus Holdings gained 2½p to 38½p after Robert Adair, the chairman, and two directors bought a total of 1.8 million shares at 36p each.

Kentz, the Irish and Malaysian-backed oil and gas engineering contractor, whose clients include Shell at its Sakhalin project, is scheduled to start trading on Tuesday on AIM with a market cap of about £135 million, brokered by Evolution Securities.

Africa Oil Exploration was flat at 16¾p on its first day of trading on Plus Markets. The investment vehicle, which focuses on the upstream oil and gas sector in Africa, raised £1.03 million via a private placing.

Nordic Panorama, the property developer and ski resort operator in Norway, lost ¾p to 1¼p after the chairman quit and it withdrew from the acquisition of a Swedish rival.

Rank Group rose ½p to 90¼p as Guoco Group, of Malaysia, raised its stake to 5.05 per cent.

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