London open: Dull start as big freeze bites

6th Jan 2010 08:49

It's all about the retailers in the pre-opening session as the post-Christmas trading update season moves into full swing with Marks & Spencer heading lower after its update.The cold weather may have seen woolly jumpers and slippers fly off the shelves at Marks & Spencer in the days before Christmas, but caution about 2010 affected sentiment early on. Kingfisher and Home Retail are lower in sympathy.A record day in the food department helped boost M&S's overall sales. Sales rose 2.6% in the 13 weeks to 26 December and by 2.3% in the UK. A 0.8% increase in UK like for like sales could have been an extra 1% higher if the period had included the first day of the Christmas sale on 27 December.Life assurance giant Prudential is to sell its products in the branches of United Overseas Bank (UOB) in Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand. In addition to this new partnership, Prudential will buy UOB's life assurance unit in Singapore for S$428m (£192m) in cash, subject to a post-completion adjustment to reflect the net asset value as at the completion date. Banks are the early risers led by state-controlled Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds. Miners are also going well with Rio Tinto and Vedanta in demand.High flying pizza delivery outfit Domino's ended 2009 with a flourish, and expects full year figures to be 'comfortably ahead' of expectations. Like for like (lfl) sales rose 8.6%, the same as in the same period a year earlier, making the lfl growth figure for the year as a whole 8.4%. This was down from the previous year's 10% lfl growth figure, however.Majestic Wines' sales jumped by nearly 12% in the nine weeks to 4 January as its decision to cut the minimum order from 12 bottles to 6 bottles paid off handsomely. "Like for like UK sales for Majestic were up 11.7% for the nine weeks of Christmas trading from 3 November 2009 to 4 January 2010," Majestic said in its Christmas update.Fantasy war games publisher and seller Games Workshop expects profits this year will come in some £5m ahead of market forecasts as cost cutting benefits and royalty income come through strongly.Aviation and distribution group John Menzies delivered a belated Christmas present to shareholders by saying that results for 2009 are expected to be ahead of expectations.Support services group Cape has seen activity levels remain strong during the second half and expects full year results to be at least in line with market expectations.