shares of tingyi cayman islands holding corp rose on tuesday morning in hong kong after the instantnoodle and beverage maker released its firsthalf results and announced a special interim dividend tingyis stock rose 79 to 1372 hong kong dollars us175 paring yeartodate losses to 14 the move bucked the overall weaker market with the citys benchmark hang seng index down 09 the shanghaibased companys net profit dropped 38 to 125 billion yuan us1825 million for the first six months weighed by a weaker gross margin of 2822 compared with 3105 a year earlier it attributed the lower gross margins for its instantnoodle and beverage segments to rising rawmaterial prices however firsthalf revenue rose 80 and tingyi declared an interim dividend of 663 us cents a share the market had expected weak margins and no special dividend ahead of the results jefferies analysts led by anne ling said in a note in addition tingyi maintained its guidance for high singledigit sales growth for 2022 and projects cny25 billioncny30 billion net profit this year they noted the analysts think the higher rawmaterial costs appear to be priced in and are unlikely to rise further beyond the first half jefferies upgraded tingyi to buy from hold while raising the stocks target price to hk1500 from hk1388