Results out soon in August.

Broker recos look very bullish and why not on a P/E of just over 6 to 2011.....

Thomas Cook Group PLC

FORECASTS 2010 2011
Date Rec Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p) Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p)

Panmure Gordon
02-08-10 BUY 319.00 27.10 11.30 338.00 28.70 12.40

Exane BNP Paribas
02-08-10 BUY 116.00 26.62 10.75 319.00 28.87 11.66

Numis Securities Ltd
02-08-10 ADD 324.20 27.60 11.25 357.10 29.90 11.81

Oriel Securities
02-08-10 BUY 330.40 28.40 11.40 363.50 31.30 12.10

KBC Peel Hunt Ltd
30-07-10 BUY 301.06 25.22 10.75 313.36 26.23 10.93

WestLB
30-07-10 SELL 28.81 11.52 29.91 11.96

Shore Capital
30-07-10 HOLD 312.00 26.50 11.80 347.00 29.50 13.00

Charles Stanley Securities
15-06-10 HOLD

Evolution Securities Ltd
11-02-10 None

Investec Securities [R]
09-02-10 BUY 327.00 27.30 11.74 352.23 29.39 12.49

Fyshe Horton Finney Ltd
25-01-10 BUY

Collins Stewart
24-12-09 BUY

Nomura Research Institute
25-09-09 RED

2010 2011
Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p) Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p)

Consensus 316.42 26.98 11.36 342.50 29.39 11.96

1 Month Change 1.07 -0.22 0.01 3.43 -0.14 -0.14
3 Month Change -11.92 -1.09 -0.05 -11.79 -1.00 -0.44


GROWTH
2009 (A) 2010 (E) 2011 (E)

Norm. EPS 2.76% 0.38% 8.92%
DPS 14.03% 10.80% 5.26%

INVESTMENT RATIOS
2009 (A) 2010 (E) 2011 (E)

EBITDA �574.90m �589.69m �613.90m
EBIT �372.50m �420.55m �447.05m
Dividend Yield 5.38% 5.96% 6.27%
Dividend Cover 2.62x 2.38x 2.46x
PER 7.10x 7.07x 6.49x
PEG 2.57f 18.55f 0.73f
Net Asset Value PS -240.80p 224.47p 240.43p

Ireland's aviation regulator has emerged as a surprise contender to buy into one of the largest shareholders in Britain's air traffic control operator.

Thomas Cook, TUI and Lufthansa are expected to sell out their positions in The Airline Group, with Virgin Atlantic possibly selling up to half of its stake. That would leave British Airways and easyJet among the carriers which continue as economic stakeholders in NATS.

Rothschild, which had previously been advising the Airline Group, is now advising the carriers which are exiting the group.

A number of pension funds from Canada, 3i, the private equity group, and overseas air traffic controllers such as DFS in Germany, are all likely to bid for the selling airlines' stakes.

Made it Fred - that was exhausting, now stay there this time!

Morgan Stanley reiterates overweight - target 150p

Bought back in at 82

Of course you did! ;o)

123p. On the move again.

Headlines like this certainly help the travel business;

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/393762/Bargain-holidays-in-the-sun-as-European-resort-prices-plunge

hmmm having a problem again at these levels trying to break out.

Itl do it at some time but how long is the question.

Anyone know when the update is?. Would be barmy to short it now.

Starting to look interesting doodles. If it goes over 128p for 48 hours another buy in my book.

Doodles must be on holiday.

gf, don't know when the update is except that it's expected sometime in May. Been on holiday doing some gardening today !

Oh right doodles. Must admit the hedges etc have buds on them.

OHHHHHH NO.

Might clear 130p today hopefully......and stay there!

Thomas Cook Group launches 24/7 rapid response social media listening lab
Press Release: Thomas Cook Group – 2 hours 58 minutes ago.. .

LONDON--(BUSINESSWIRE)--

Building on its already strong digital credentials, the new Thomas Cook Listening Lab, coupled with a specially trained social media listening team, has been launched to learn from customers’ social sentiment, improve marketing strategies, and build stronger customer relations.

Building on the company’s already strong digital credentials, and as part of its omni-channel approach has taken its social media listening to the next level with the implementation, of what is to be believed, as a travel industry first, a bespoke 24/7 social media monitoring facility. The Thomas Cook Listening Lab, using a specially trained social media listening team will provide real-time global brand reputation management, listening in over 180 languages about “chatter” around their brands. The team will identify social ‘brand champions’ and who the company should be interacting with socially to help increase sales. Data will also be collected that will be used for future marketing campaigns and to provide insight on how to heighten social brand awareness. The facility will aid in crisis management, provide real time comparison of competitor brands, and importantly, listen to all customer sentiment. The facility also features tools to engage with customers directly through countless social media channels. The Listening Lab and its team have already proven to be an effective instrument in changing customer sentiment and responding to customers’ queries.

“We were the first major high street travel agency in the UK to offer online bookings, last year we had 310 million visits to our websites, ThomasCook.com was labelled #5 travel/e-travel site in 2012 eDigital Research Best Site benchmark and just this month our new mobile website was said to ‘set the standard’ and received a 10 out of 10 by travel technology consultant Paul Richer,” said Harriet Green .“As we expand our digital capabilities, my vision for Thomas Cook is to be the leading online tour operator and to have the highest share of bookings online. Our Thomas Cook Listening Lab will allow us to better position Thomas Cook as the leading travel authority by listening and monitoring customer sentiment, enabling us to discovering useful and valued information about our customers. The Listening Lab will further help our customer services team to better engage with our customers in active dialogues, and provide relevant, fresh and valuable content to key audiences.”

“Being proactive and having to monitor thousands of social mentions a day can be difficult and time consuming, but with the Thomas Cook Listening Lab, coupled with social media listing experts, we are able to see and resolve social concerns with our social media customer care team,” said Jonathan Roberts, Global Head of Social Media for Thomas Cook Group plc. “Monitoring is also instrumental in Thomas Cook’s success, whereby the real-time data collected through social media is ‘key’ in all future marketing, PR and advertising campaigns. We can also quickly see what is being discussed in real time about any of our major competitors or our own marketing campaigns, television adverts or product launches, and within hours, our marketing teams can create additional sales messages, and then direct fans via social platforms to learn more about special offers or holiday packages. Through the Listening Lab we now have the ability to target a specific customer base, for example if we want to target people in London who have recently tweeted, “I need a holiday”, we now have the tools to reach out to those people and make an informed pitch based on their online social profile; revealing their age, gender and likes and dislikes.”

The Thomas Cook Listening Lab has been created and is managed by Chapel Social (http://www.chapelsocial.com/), a division of Chapel PR and Marketing, to specifically monitor all of Thomas Cook’s 60+ global brands, in real-time across all social media platforms. The facility features six large monitors, contains specially designed computers, with speakers, and a video conferencing camera that allows for meetings with regional marketing teams and to help coordinate with teams at live-location events. There are four additional desktop systems for the purpose of social engagement with Thomas Cook’s customers. The larger monitors show real-time tracking with various data visualisations and dashboards, aided by a variety of software integrated into a platform ideal for Thomas Cook’s social media listening and engagement needs.

-END-

Get on board the train is about to depart.

Flippin' 'eck. We're there! 130p and holding!

RNS Number : 4469D
Thomas Cook Group PLC
29 April 2013

Thomas Cook Group plc
(the "Company")

Integration of Condor and Condor Berlin Flight Operations

The merger of the two Thomas Cook Airline flight operations, Condor Flugdienst GmbH and its wholly owned subsidiary Condor Berlin GmbH, will complete on 1 May 2013.

Condor Flugdienst is based in Frankfurt and, with effect from 1 May 2013, will include all activity of the Condor Berlin flight operations. The fleet of Condor Berlin, consisting of twelve Airbus A320-200 aircraft and one Airbus A321-200, will be integrated into the operations of Condor Flugdienst.

"As a result of the integration the Air Operator Certificate (AOC) of Condor Flugdienst will be expanded to include the Airbus fleet of Condor Berlin. We have also reviewed the necessary staffing levels and organisational structures accordingly and we will operate all Boeing and Airbus aircraft of the Condor fleet under one AOC", explains Ralf Teckentrup, joint Chairman of Thomas Cook Group Airlines and CEO of Condor Flugdienst.

The integration of flight operations will take advantage of synergies to reduce complexity and costs. Cost savings will for example result from qualifying the cabin staff for both the Airbus A320 and Boeing B757 fleet and the reduction of IT costs through the integration of duplicate systems. As part of the wider transformation of Thomas Cook Group Airlines and Condor, the merging of these flight operations is an important step towards developing the Thomas Cook Airline Segment.

Christoph Debus, joint Chairman of Thomas Cook Group Airlines said: "We are very pleased that the integration of our flight operations based in Germany will complete on 1 May 2013. This is an important step in delivering the Group Airlines strategy, as we continue to create one airline segment, as well as a major contribution in terms of cost effectiveness within the Group."

Condor Berlin GmbH will continue to exist as a maintenance company in Berlin performing maintenance activities on the Airbus fleet as part of the Thomas Cook Group Maintenance Organisation (GMO).

This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange

'We're back' says Thomas Cook chief


01 May 2013 at 08.00 GMT


The head of Thomas Cook UK declared the group’s intention to be the most-profitable travel firm in Britain yesterday, saying Cook is firmly back in the UK market.

Thomas Cook chief executive for the UK and Continental Europe Peter Fankhauser said: “Believe me we’re back.

He insisted: “We will stay the biggest travel retailer in the UK.”

Giving a presentation on the group’s turnaround in the UK and its summer 2014 programme, Fankhauser said: “In three years we want to be the most profitable brand in the UK and the most loved.”

Fankhauser cited recent Travel Weekly research, carried out by Explore, and argued: “This tells us 42% of adults expect to interact with Thomas Cook this year.

“That gives us confidence our brand strength is intact.”

He described the turnaround at the UK group which he said began at the top “like cleaning the stairs”.

“We start with a competitive structure. We are reducing our workforce from 15,500 to 13,000 – that is a lot and it has to be carefully done – and we will close 195 shops which are not profitable.

“These are massive steps, but it is not all about cost. It is about product.

“We have improved the product mix, introducing more all-inclusive and more exclusive product, more flexibility and more dynamic packaging.”

Fankhauser said: “We are going to significantly improve our flight offer with more flights, better connectivity and one group airline, including a codeshare with [Thomas Cook’s German carrier] Condor.”

The group will expand its exclusive international hotel brands Sentido and Sunprime and introduce a third, Smartline - “a good property for a good price”.

Fankhauser said: “We are tidying up the myth that Britons only like to holiday where there are Britons and Germans where there are Germans.”

He said research among 18,000 Thomas Cook clients in the group’s major markets found “perhaps 10% of clients where this is true - the rest like international products”.

Fankhauser said: “We will have a big focus on web capability in the UK.” But referring to the high street, he said: “We are going to stay the biggest travel retailer in the UK.”

He added: “We are going to do all this fast - most of the work on a new competitive structure is already done.”

Fankhauser would not comment on UK sales for this summer ahead of a group trading update, but he said: “We are totally happy and relaxed about this summer.”