Falkland prepares for oilfield production

The company, which has been modernising operations and strengthening the management team to make the most of the potential business opportunities, also saw sales and profits edge up last year.

Group revenue increased by 4.4 per cent to £35.6 million, with underlying pre-tax profits up by 1.9 per cent to £3.29m.

Following the results, several directors went into the market to increase their holdings.

Chairman David Hudd purchased 5,000 shares at 340p each to take his holding to 115,630 shares. Board colleague John Foster acquired 6,000 shares at 350p and holds 31,584 shares.

Jeremy Brade acquired 4,700 shares at a similar price and now holds 12,500 shares. Mike Killingley bought 14,000 shares and now holds 30,000 shares.

n Michael Clarke, a non- executive director at plumbing group Wolseley, has increased his stake with the purchase of 2,000 shares at 3,253p.

n The chairman and a director of financial services group Prudential have  increased their holdings.

Chairman Paul Manduca bought 20,000 shares at 1,067.5p to take his holding up to 42,500.

Non-executive director Anthony Nightingale made his first purchase by investing more than £150,000.

n Crawford Currie, a director at Finsbury Food Group, has bought 41,000 shares at 56p each. As a result, his total holding rose to 136,238.

Currie is finance director of Hamilton-based cake manufacturer Lightbody Group, which was bought by Finsbury in 2007.

n Two directors at agriculture, food and engineering group Carr’s have bought shares.

Chief executive officer Tim Davies and group finance director Neil Austin bought 1,000 shares each at 1,278p.

The company recently said a new flour mill in Kirkcaldy was on target  to start production in  September.

n Russell Lamming, chief executive of gold producer Goldplat, purchased 126,700 shares at 7.5p each.

He now holds 471,784 shares.