London close: Stocks end slightly lower

26th Jul 2013 18:14

The Footsie ended the day slightly in the red following a weak start on Wall Street and with a similar pattern to yesterday´s emerging, with equities in core European countries such as the UK and Germany on the back foot while periphery equities tended to outperform. The top flight index finished 33 points lower at 6,555.Weighing on shares Stateside, the University of Michigan´s consumer confidence gauge showed a small retreat in expectations although overall animal spirits were at their highest since July 2007. That was the month in which the S and P 500 reached its previous peak, before the onset of the current financial crisis.Acting as a backdrop, overnight China ordered more than 1,400 companies in 19 industries to cut excess production capacity this year as it seeks to move towards a more sustainable growth model. In a more positive vein, Activision Blizzard is leading an $8.2bn investor buyout of most of Vivendi's controlling stake in the world's largest video games company. Significantly, the group behind Call of Duty and World of Warcraft will use about $1.2bn in cash but roughly $4.6bn of debt - a large amount of leverage - to buy 429m shares from Vivendi, according to The Financial Times. Such amounts of leverage may be saying something about just how far the recovery in capital markets has come since the onset of the financial crisis.Much commented as well, the latest consumer price data in Japan revealed an 0.2% increase on the month for June, ahead of the 0.1% rise foreseen. There was some market commentary speculating this morning that the country may now indeed be nearing the point where it is able to exit from deflation. However, at least a handful of top economists have pointed out that such gains have much to do with the recent weakening in the Yen, so it might be best not to get carried away just yet even if the recent moderation in global food and oil prices have possibly also weighed on the data. No major data were scheduled for release today in London. FTSE 100: Pearson beats on both the top line as well as the bottom linePearson's half-year sales rose 5.0% to £2.7bn as growth in digital, services and developing-market businesses offset tough conditions in traditional publishing. That beat the 2.69bn pounds which analysts had penciled in. Earnings per share (EPS) - including restructuring charges- fell sharply, however at 9.9p they still came in ahead of expectations of 9.0p.British Sky Broadcasting (BSkyB) achieved "record" annual results with a 7.0% increase in revenue to £7.2bn - ahead of estimates - and 4.0% jump in operating profit to £1.3bn. The company said its successful transition to more broadly-based growth, combined with the acquisition of O2's consumer broadband and fixed-line telephony business, delivered an increase of 1.4m subscription products in the fourth quarter. The company has announced a £500m share buy-back program and an 18% hike in its dividend payments even as net debt grew significantly. Possibly in a prescient manner Investec noted the shares string run going into today´s report and advised clients that taking near-term profits would be justified if the performance continued apace.Mining giant Anglo American announced a 1% drop in its top line to $16.193bn for the first half of 2013, with management highlighting the increasing uncertainty and volatility around the short-term outlook as China moves to a more sustainable growth path and model. Nevertheless, the company expressed confidence in the medium-term outlook. Profit before taxes fell by 34% to $1,994m. Even so, operating cash-flow improved by 19% to $3,167m versus last year´s figures. Earnings per share came in at 98 US cents, comofrtably above the 90 cents expected by the consensus. Serco Group surged after analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald reiterated a 'buy' rating for the British government services company's stock.For analysts at Jefferies examining and understanding the detail of the first half 2013 results at Rolls Royce may take some time. Yet they believe the underlying message is that RR is on course, has made progress in some key areas such as on-time delivery performance and is determined to extend that progress to costs and cash. "Provided the majority share our view that fiscal year 2013 is in large part a year of preparation for strong volume growth in fiscal year 2014 and beyond and that RR is in better shape to exploit that growth, the RR equity story will continue to enjoy positive momentum, in our view," they added. Analysts at Deutsche Bank however differed, they have downgraded the company´s shares to sell this morning.Brewer SABMiller saw lager volumes drop in Europe and North America but toasted improved overall group revenue in the first quarter. Group revenue and group revenue per hectolitre both grew by 2.0% on an organic basis at constant currencies, but depreciation of several key currencies against the US dollar will adversely impact reported results. Credit Suisse shaved its price target as a result but believes an attractive entry point may be at hand for investors. BG Group reported a drop in operating profit and earnings for the half year, reflecting fewer liquefied natural gas cargo deliveries, a fall in exploration and production volumes and lower realised oil and liquids prices. Total operating profit declined 5.0% to $3.9bn as revenue and other operating income slid 3.0% to $9.2bn.FTSE 250: Bodycote leads gains following resultsBodycote's shares advanced after the British engineering company reported a 10 per cent rise in profit for the first half, boosted by acquisitions. COLT Group SA surged after Deutsche Bank reiterated a 'buy' rating for the stocks of the multinational telecommunications, IT managed services and data centre services company.Semiconductor company CSR declined a day after lifting its second-quarter revenue forecast.Homeserve tumbled as analysts at Liberum Capital reiterated a 'hold' rating after the home emergency business said it expects a small operating loss in the first six months of fiscal 2014.FTSE 100 - RisersPearson (PSON) 1,329.00p +6.15%Capita (CPI) 1,022.00p +2.56%Standard Chartered (STAN) 1,502.00p +1.35%Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,180.00p +1.11%Serco Group (SRP) 617.50p +0.82%Burberry Group (BRBY) 1,515.00p +0.73%BT Group (BT.A) 336.80p +0.72%Johnson Matthey (JMAT) 2,779.00p +0.65%Meggitt (MGGT) 541.50p +0.65%BG Group (BG.) 1,190.00p +0.42%FTSE 100 - FallersPersimmon (PSN) 1,219.00p -3.64%British Sky Broadcasting Group (BSY) 822.00p -3.29%Rolls-Royce Holdings (RR.) 1,200.00p -3.23%Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 328.00p -2.99%easyJet (EZJ) 1,360.00p -2.58%Rexam (REX) 476.70p -2.32%Prudential (PRU) 1,144.00p -2.22%InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) 1,885.00p -2.13%Unilever (ULVR) 2,620.00p -2.09%Marks & Spencer Group (MKS) 469.80p -1.84%FTSE 250 - RisersBodycote (BOY) 613.00p +5.15%Hochschild Mining (HOC) 170.50p +2.71%Ferrexpo (FXPO) 168.50p +2.12%Pace (PIC) 278.70p +2.09%Kazakhmys (KAZ) 268.50p +1.97%Big Yellow Group (BYG) 431.60p +1.89%TalkTalk Telecom Group (TALK) 243.80p +1.75%Bumi (BUMI) 228.90p +1.73%IP Group (IPO) 152.50p +1.67%Kentz Corporation Ltd. (KENZ) 433.00p +1.62%FTSE 250 - FallersCSR (CSR) 578.00p -3.67%Barratt Developments (BDEV) 331.00p -3.27%Homeserve (HSV) 266.00p -3.27%888 Holdings (888) 156.00p -3.11%Euromoney Institutional Investor (ERM) 1,047.00p -2.88%Daejan Holdings (DJAN) 3,936.00p -2.79%Man Group (EMG) 83.65p -2.73%Tullett Prebon (TLPR) 344.50p -2.68%Rank Group (RNK) 157.00p -2.48%Victrex (VCT) 1,495.00p -2.16%FTSE TechMARK - RisersVectura Group (VEC) 92.00p +9.52%Gresham Computing (GHT) 90.00p +9.09%Ark Therapeutics Group (AKT) 0.47p +8.05%Optos (OPTS) 160.00p +6.67%Sepura (SEPU) 140.50p +5.05%Vislink (VLK) 35.88p +2.50%Oxford Biomedica (OXB) 1.46p +2.46%Skyepharma (SKP) 66.75p +2.30%E2V Technologies (E2V) 129.00p +1.18%Ricardo (RCDO) 432.00p +1.17%FTSE TechMARK - FallersSDL (SDL) 306.75p -1.92%Phoenix IT Group (PNX) 157.00p -1.26%Emblaze Ltd. (BLZ) 50.50p -0.98%Promethean World (PRW) 14.00p -0.89%BATM Advanced Communications Ltd. (BVC) 15.38p -0.81%Filtronic (FTC) 63.00p -0.79%Kofax (KFX) 345.25p -0.58%RM (RM.) 83.50p -0.30%NCC Group (NCC) 129.75p -0.19%Wolfson Microelectronics (WLF) 147.25p -0.17%AB