London close: Another red day for Footsie
London's recovery attempt fizzled out during the afternoon despite triple figure gains in the US, with a weak mining sector and gloomy banks sending the leading index sharply lower.
Miners came under selling pressure for the second day in a row on falling metal prices. Anglo American, Antofagasta and Xstrata sank on worries over the copper price if demand from China eases.
Oil majors also slipped as crude prices fell more than a dollar despite ongoing concerns about Iran's nuclear ambitions. Shell, BP and Cairn all dropped.
Mortgage bank HBOS led the blue chip losers despite pre-tax profits rising 19% to £5.71bn in 2006. Analysts were unimpressed with guidance and comments that margins in the mortgage market will fall again this year. Barclays fell in sympathy.
Standard Chartered turned sharply lower as comments yesterday that it is expanding heavily in China coincided with the slump in share prices there over the past couple of days.
But leisure group Whitbread reversed initial losses following a very strong trading statement. It said sales for the 50 weeks to 15 February grew by 10.3% and like-for-like sales are up by 4.3%, though it played down takeover talk.
Vague bid chat spurred gains at Home Retail, with ongoing speculation of a private equity move for the Argos-owner worth 530p, while support services firm Capita improved on a Deutsche Bank upgrade to 'buy' from 'hold'.
Elsewhere, digital camera retailer Jessops warned that trading conditions have worsened since January's update, with profit for the year seen at around £6.5m.
Housebuilder Barratt Developments lifted first half profits by over 10% to £180.2m and added that the housing market remained sound. Completions rose to 7,206 (2005: 7,003) up by 3% while the average selling price was £165,000 up by 1.3%.
LogicaCMG posted full year pre-tax profit up to £129m versus £104.8m last year on revenue that rose 45.3% at £2.66bn. It said its IT services margins increased or were maintained in all major geographies
Support services giant Serco reported a 38% rise in profits to £107.4m for 2006 on revenues up by 12.7% at £2.55bn. The forward order book stood at £13.9bn at the year-end with the company confident of maintaining double-digit growth and improving margins.
Magners cider group C&C expects to post a rise in turnover from continuing operations of about 25% for the business year just ended and predicts operating profit in the coming year should rise 15% to 25%, but this is below previous market estimates and the shares fell.
Computer services firm Morse reported "excellent progress" at both its main business and smaller secure mobile banking applications unit, although first half pre-tax profit slipped following spending on its Monitise business.
Engineer Rotork was among the second tier leaders after it proposed the payout of a special dividend following further growth in 2006.
Retailer Debenhams also finished in the blue on talk that acquisitive Icelandic firm Baugur is circling.
FTSE 100 - Risers
Capita Group (CPI) 647.00p +1.81%
Whitbread (WTB) 1,648.00p +1.04%
Reuters Group (RTR) 435.75p +0.87%
Home Retail Group (HOME) 423.00p +0.71%
Next (NXT) 2,042.00p +0.69%
Associated British Foods (ABF) 825.00p +0.49%
Johnson Matthey (JMAT) 1,542.00p +0.33%
ICAP (IAP) 471.00p +0.21%
Drax (DRX) 715.00p +0.21%
BSkyB (BSY) 557.00p +0.18%
FTSE 100 - Fallers
HBOS (HBOS) 1,081.00p -4.59%
Cable and Wireless (CW.) 164.75p -3.94%
Barclays (BARC) 740.00p -3.65%
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Anglo American (AAL) 2,416.00p -3.63%
Reed Elsevier (REL) 593.50p -3.57%
BG Group (BG.) 692.00p -3.49%
Xstrata (XTA) 2,395.00p -3.39%
Reckitt Benckiser (RB.) 2,564.00p -3.21%
Kazakhmys (KAZ) 1,101.00p -3.08%
Wolseley (WOS) 1,279.00p -2.96%
FTSE 250 - Risers
St Modwen Property (SMP) 640.00p +3.90%
UK Commerical Property Trust (UKCM) 100.25p +3.62%
Rotork (ROR) 813.00p +3.44%
Benfield Group (BFD) 347.00p +3.04%
Collins Stewart (CLST) 228.00p +2.93%
Colt Telecom (COLT) 160.75p +2.39%
Venture Production (VPC) 657.50p +2.33%
N Brown (BWNG) 318.75p +2.25%
Debenhams (DEB) 181.75p +2.11%
WH Smith (SMWH) 398.25p +2.05%
FTSE 250 - Fallers
Keller Group (KLR) 882.00p -6.22%
Henderson Group (HGI) 137.00p -4.36%
Brit Insurance (BRE) 309.25p -3.81%
Aberdeen Asset Management (ADN) 191.50p -3.53%
Southern Cross Healthcare (SCHE) 361.00p -3.41%
Alfred McAlpine (MCA) 459.50p -3.36%
Aquarius Platinum (AQP) 1,412.00p -3.29%
Spirent (SPT) 61.00p -3.17%
Wimpey (WMPY) 569.00p -3.15%
Randgold Resources (RRS) 1,158.00p -3.02%
