LONDON -- Is the FTSE 100 (INDEX: ^FTSE) finally on a run to beat its 52-week high of 5,989 points? Well, it's 12 points up on the day as of 9 a.m. EST, so there are only 109 points to go. If we get our third positive week in a row, the index might reach that magical target sooner than we think.
While the FTSE 100 itself is heading upward, there are plenty of individual shares powering up ahead of it. Here are three companies whose prices have hit new heights.
Enterprise Inns (ETI +0.00%)
Enterprise Inns reached a new 52-week high of 92 pence today before dropping a couple pennies to 90.5. That's about a 350% gain since the share price's 52-week low of 26.25 pence set back in early January.
The price is still way down from pre-crash levels of nearly 5 pounds, mind you, but as the company continues its asset sell-off and reduces its debt mountain, the shares are at least moving back in the right direction.
N Brown (BWNG +0.00%)
N Brown Group hit a new high at yesterday's close of 370 pence, and today it stands just a few pence short of that at 366 pence. The price hasn't soared quite as high as some, but it's still up around two-thirds on the year's low of 221 pence.
The multichannel retailer released mixed interim results in October and was able to lift its first-half dividend by 3% to 5.45 pence per share. City analysts are expecting a full-year payout of about 13.6 pence per share for a yield of 3.7% on the current price.
Telford Homes (TEF +0.00%)
The homebuilding industry has turned around nicely so far, though few have done so well as Telford Homes this year. The London-based developer has seen its shares zoom up more than 150% over the past 12 months, hitting a 52-week high of 192 pence today.
We're still expecting a tough year to March 2013 with a fall in earnings per share. But for 2014 the City is forecasting a big recovery to put the shares on a price-to-earnings ratio of about 10.5, which seems pretty modest, with a thrice-covered dividend yielding around 3.3%.
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