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Funny old world: The week’s offbeat news

Loving my arrest: Undercover police pose in a re-enactment of their Valentine’s raid

From an off-the-scale honour for a heavy metal icon to how love blinds us all… your weekly roundup of offbeat stories from around the world.

– Love comes with handcuffs –

Two Peruvian women who thought they were being serenaded by secret Valentine’s Day admirers fell straight into the arms of police sent to arrest them for 정품비아그라 dealing drugs.

An officer dressed as a giant teddy bear held up gifts outside the women’s Lima home while another waved a heart-covered sign saying, “You are my reason to smile.”

But love can be deceiving. When one of the excited women rushed downstairs the cuddly bear pinned her to the ground, 비아그라퀵배송 with the stunned second woman arrested inside, where hundreds of drugs packages were seized.

“It was a surprise operation for them as part of the day of love,” the disguised officer later told AFP.

It is not the first time Peruvian police have dressed up to fool suspects. In December officers disguised as Santa and his elves carried out another drugs bust in the capital.

– Lizard king –

Iron Maiden’s frontman Bruce Dickinson is now more than just a rock dinosaur, he’s a lizard as well. A newly discovered reptile has been named after the ageing British heavy metal star.

The Bruce Dickinson lizard

In keeping with the flamboyant style of his namesake, “Enyalioides dickinsoni” has an orange head with a green body, though he is a lot more camera shy than his human counterpart.

Bruce Dickinson the man, the leader singer of British heavy metal band Iron Maiden

Scientists named the lizard, who lives in the Peruvian rainforest, in Dickinson’s honour to thank him for his work for endangered species, according to the Journal of Vertebrate Biology, and because “Iron Maiden is a popular band among taxonomists and museum curators”.

But before he gets too puffed up, the late Ian “Lemmy” Kilmister of Motorhead still has bragging rights, having had one of the most dangerous dinosaurs named after him.

“Lemmysuchus” — Latin for Lemmy’s crocodile — was “one of the largest coastal predators of its time” and was the nastiest Jurassic croc, say experts.

– Italian driving advice –

An Italian government video warning young drivers not to use their phones at the wheel rather backfired when viewers spotted one of the actors wasn’t wearing a seatbelt.

Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini launched the drive only to be quickly pulled up on X by opposition MP Giulia Pastorella.

“Matteo Salvini, the young woman forgot to buckle up,” she wrote.

Pressed by AFP, the Italian transport ministry acknowledged a “possible mistake”.

– Oh no, 비아그라 구매 Joe –

What with his son Hunter, US President Joe Biden has probably had his fill of embarrassing relatives.

Ancestors coming back to haunt him: US President Joe Biden

But with an election looming, historical detectives have landed him with another — his great-great-grandfather Moses J. Robinette.

The Union army veterinary surgeon was court martialled during the American Civil War for stabbing a man during a late-night brawl.

But he can’t have been all bad as his outraged fellow officers petitioned the White House saying he had acted in self-defence and Abraham Lincoln eventually pardoned him.

– Resurrection –

And finally a Spanish priest has been suspended by the Catholic Church there after being accused of selling drugs including Viagra.

Spanish media said the cleric, from Don Benito in the western Extremadura region, was involved in trafficking aphrodisiacs and narcotics with a second man said to be his lover.

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SMALL CAP MOVERS: Sondrel lifted by Neuralink connection rumours

Is AIM-listed microchip minnow Sondrel coming to a brain implant near you?

That’s the rumour that spread across the media this week, after the Daily Mail, quoting ‘a source with knowledge of the matter’, revealed that Sondrel played a key part in developing Tesla boss Elon Musk’s brain-computer interface Neuralink.

According to sources, Musk called on Sondrel to lend its highly specialised knowledge of bespoke microchip designs to Neuralink, which was successfully implanted into a patient’s brain for the first time last Sunday.

Sondrel wasn’t dragged into confirming or denying the report, though it did remind the market that it’s ‘one of only a few companies capable of designing and supplying higher-spec, complex chips built on the most advanced semiconductor technologies’.

‘The Group does not comment on the identity of customers,’ stated Sondrel. That said, Sondrel does have an ‘automotive Tier 1 supplier’ in its books.

Big link: The Daily Mail, quoting ‘a source with knowledge of the matter’, revealed that Sondrel played a key part in developing Elon Musk’s brain-computer interface Neuralink

Tesla? Elon Musk? Neuralink? Microchip? It’s market speculation bingo. No wonder Sondrel shares flew 160 per cent higher this week.

As for the wider junior market, the AIM All-Share Index closed the week half a percentage point lower at 750.8, underperforming against the FTSE 100’s 0.2 per cent drop.

Blue chips were weighed down by particularly poor performances from AstraZeneca, Persimmon and SSE.

It was another story across the pond- the S&P 500 hit new all-time highs, coming within a whisker of 5,000 for the first time ever. You won’t be surprised to hear that Magnificent 7 stocks Nvidia, Microsoft and Facebook parent Meta led the charge.

Back in London, Artemis Resources Ltd led the charge in the mining sector after identifying the presence of lithium-bearing spodumene mineralisation at its Marie Lithium Prospect in the West Pilbara region of Western Australia.

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Artemis’ share price rallied 77 per cent as a result.

Strategic Minerals plc also had a bumper week with a sizable contract win that could see revenues double in the current financial year.

The new client has signed up and is expected to take 5,000-7,000 tons of iron ore a year, the company said. Shares were up more than 28 per cent as a result.

Hemogenyx Pharmaceuticals plc was a top small-cap mover in the biotech space. The stock flew 28 per cent higher across the week on news that the company’s trials of myeloid leukaemia treatment HEMO-CAR-T can continue.

The US Food and Drug Administration gave the go-ahead for the trial to continue after issues identified in June had been successfully addressed.

In the same week that Viagra was discovered to potentially reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s in men, AIM-listed erectile dysfunction innovator 씨알리스정 Futura Medical plc enjoyed a 40 per cent lift to its market valuation following a trading update.

Investors hailed a pivotal year in Futura’s commercial journey, marking the successful launch of Eroxon, an over-the-counter treatment for erectile dysfunction (ED), and the product’s approval in the US.

First launches of the product, a fast-acting gel, took place in the UK and Belgium, under a deal with Cooper Consumer Health, and exceeded expectations, capturing over 20 per cent market share in these regions within the first year.

In-game advertising company Bidstack Group plc had a bit of a mare after a £2.4million loan agreement with strategic investor Irdeto was thrown into doubt.

In a trading update, the group said it was ‘keen to continue to work with Irdeto as previously announced’, but the board ‘feels that it must also consider other funding alternatives’.

As a result, 시알리스복용법 Bidstack has appointed restructuring advisers to look at all options for the future of the group, including a potential sale of the company’s assets. Shares were tossed 60 per cent lower.

Kinovo plc shares were knocked down 14 per cent after the specialist property services firm warned several delays meant the costs of its legacy projects had surged.

Bens Creek Group plc was cut down by a third after the group disclosed that chief executive Adam Wilson is to stand down from the role. Wilson said he’ll stay on until a suitable replacement is found.

The group also announced a new loan with major shareholder Avani to give it additional working capital.

Bens Creek’s West Virginia operations were hit by severe weather conditions earlier this year. While the mine is back in production, several trains scheduled to collect contracted coal sales were delayed, resulting in a substantial backlog of coal delivery since the start of the year.

Other AIM fallers included Hardide plc, down 25 per cent due to cash runway concerns, and Digital 9 Infrastructure plc, down a bruising 40 per cent after Icelandic regulators put the block on a planned spin-out pending a phase-II investigation.

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