Lack of detail does for Tanfield

Vehicles and access equipment group Tanfield has finally issued an announcement after a severe slump in its shares this week.

To recap, the company was reportedly considering making redundant 30 of 130 staff employed at a plant in county Durham and was expected to give a trading update next Tuesday.

Following another huge decline in its shares this morning, it has issued a holding statement confirming the timing of the trading update, and attributing the share price fall to a profit warning from US powered lifts rival OshKosh Corporation. But it gave very little other information. It has also issued its annual report which is mainly historic but also fairly upbeat about the outlook.

Given that the company has been criticised for issuing statements which are short on detail, all this has done little to mollify investors.

There was no indication that Tanfield was not suffering the same problems as OshKosh, no comments on current trading ahead of the Tuesday statement and nothing about the departure of executive vice president Frank Scarborough from its recent acquisition Snorkel in the US.

So its shares are now down another 24% at 38.75p.