London close: Footsie ends with modest gains
London's top stocks ended with modest gains after a late rally was ebbed away by poor performance on Wall Street.
Surging metal prices had London listed miners dominating the blue chip leader board, offsetting losses posted by supermarket group J Sainsbury on diminishing bid hopes.
Vedanta, Rio Tinto, Anglo American and Kazakhmys all improved following a 4% rise in copper prices and big gains elsewhere. In addition, acquisitive big gun Xstrata climbed having boosted its coal reserves with the agreed takeover of Australian coal miner Gloucester Coal for $320m.
J Sainsbury fell on press reports that Lord Sainsbury of Turville and his family have blocked a higher, 582p per share offer from a trio of private equity bidders and have continued to indicate that they would be unhappy with less than 600p a share.
In M&A news, Royal Bank of Scotland was slightly higher after broker Merrill Lynch kept the UK bank as a 'buy' on weekend press chat of a possible joint bid for ABN Amro with Spain's Banco Santander.
According to reports in the Sunday Telegraph, Royal Bank is ready to launch an offer that would disrupt the proposed £80bn merger between rival Barclays and the Dutch bank.
Imperial Tobacco shrugged off early losses that had followed the rejection by French-Spanish group Altadis of an improved offer worth €47 a share as still being too low.
But Vodafone helped the blue chip index push higher thanks to an upgrade to 'peer perform' at Bear Stearns and news of a spare parts supply and distribution deal with Ericsson.
Nuclear power group British Energy jumped after it said total output for the financial year ended 31 March was 58.4TWh, marginally ahead of current market expectations, with nuclear output at 51.2TWh and coal 7.2TWh.
Tate & Lyle has filed a case in the US against three Chinese manufacturers for infringement of its patents covering the manufacture of zero-calorie sweetener sucralose. The action also includes 18 importers and distributors.
AIM-listed market research group YouGov lifted interim profit before tax by 64% from £1.4m to £2.3m. Revenues rose by 61% to £6.1m. The company added that the momentum seen in the year to date has continued to build in the second half.
No-frills airline Easyjet saw passenger numbers in March rise by 12.3% to 3.09m, compared with this time last year. The load factor fell to 84.4% from 86.3%.
Troubled vehicle replacement group Accident Exchange, which warned in February that third quarter growth was below expectations, today cut full year forecasts and said it was considering an equity fundraising.
Healthcare group Goldshield said talks with chief executive Ajit Patel concerning a possible management buyout deal, first announced last November, have been terminated. But following the discussion of alternative strategic arrangements, the firm said it is in the process of finalising the reorganisation of Goldshield into two divisions.
Shares in Conival surged after the food and beverage firm launched its Blenheim Palace Provisions range in Sainsbury's supermarkets.
Hybrid electric vehicle group Azure Dynamics also motored ahead after signing an agreement with Mexican firm Electro Autos Eficaces (EAE) to supply 1,000 drive systems.
FTSE 100 - Risers
Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,432.00p +3.62%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 3,120.00p +2.46%
3i (III) 1,190.00p +1.97%
BHP Billiton plc (BLT) 1,181.00p +1.90%
Wolseley (WOS) 1,274.00p +1.84%
Enterprise Inns (ETI) 667.50p +1.83%
International Power (IPR) 421.75p +1.81%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 522.75p +1.80%
British Land (BLND) 1,582.00p +1.67%
Kazakhmys (KAZ) 1,220.00p +1.67%
FTSE 100 - Fallers
Sainsbury (SBRY) 538.50p -4.01%
Scottish and Newcastle (SCTN) 595.00p -1.90%
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Astrazeneca (AZN) 2,735.00p -1.12%
William Morrison (MRW) 315.75p -0.94%
SABMiller (SAB) 1,115.00p -0.80%
Alliance and Leicester (AL.) 1,127.00p -0.70%
Kingfisher (KGF) 277.00p -0.63%
Tesco (TSCO) 455.50p -0.60%
Tate & Lyle (TATE) 593.00p -0.59%
Scottish Power (SPW) 820.00p -0.55%
FTSE 250 - Risers
PartyGaming (PRTY) 56.00p +6.16%
Ashtead Group (AHT) 164.00p +5.98%
WH Smith (SMWH) 434.00p +5.08%
Greggs (GRG) 5,171.00p +3.79%
Michael Page (MPI) 580.75p +3.71%
Assura Group (AGR) 226.00p +3.43%
Croda (CRDA) 670.00p +3.08%
Northgate Information Solutions (NIS) 84.00p +3.07%
Avis Europe (AVE) 72.00p +2.86%
Daejan Holdings (DJAN) 5,399.00p +2.84%
FTSE 250 - Fallers
Petrofac Ld (PFC) 437.75p -4.00%
Carphone Warehouse (CPW) 284.75p -2.82%
Abbot Group (ABG) 258.75p -2.45%
Forth Ports (FPT) 2,075.00p -1.84%
Woolworths Group (WLW) 29.75p -1.65%
Euromoney Institutional Investor (ERM) 620.00p -1.59%
F&C Asset Management (FCAM) 189.75p -1.30%
Biffa (BIFF) 331.75p -1.19%
Hochschild Mining PLC Ord 50p (WI) (HOC) 364.50p -1.02%
Redrow (RDW) 647.50p -0.99%
