Investors react to Bradford & Bingley cash call

Angus Rigby, Chief Executive Officer, TD Waterhouse comments: Another week, another cash call, this time from mortgage lender Bradford & Bingley (B&B) which yesterday confirmed it is launching a £300m rights issue to restore stability on its balance sheets despite shrugging off plans to do so a month ago. Investors will be offered 16 new shares for every 25 they already own, priced at 82p per share. B&B is the third player to be embroiled in emergency fundraising, following in the footsteps of Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and HBOS who have also turned to their investors to cough up and boost liquidity. B&B's share price took a tumble on this news and our customers saw an opportunity to buy into the lender with hopes of longer term performance.

Royal Bank of Scotland continued its reign as most traded stock this week with near equal buys and sells that accounted for just under a third (31 per cent) of all TD Waterhouse investor trades. Customers took profits from HBOS who recently announced it would be cutting its dividend payout ratio to 40 per cent from 46 per cent and paying up in shares instead of cash. Investors also took shares from grocery giant Tesco, following news this week that the company has secured a billion pound hypermarket deal to fund store expansion in South Korea.

Elsewhere, video search engine Blinkx was a popular buy for our trading customers this week. Shares in the company are up by over 30 per cent on last week, breaking a seventh month high following market rumours that the company might be up for sale with a possible media buyout by giants Google and NewsCorp. Blinkx was founded in 2004 and floated on AIM a year ago, following a merger with UK search engine firm, Autonomy.