London pre-open: Footsie set to dip below 5,000

14th Sep 2009 07:22

Footsie looks set to dip back below 5,000 this morning with traders anticipating the blue-chip index will open around 50 points lower. The Brazilian National Defence Council has approved the sale of Rio Tinto’s Corumbá iron ore mine in Brazil to Vale S.A for $750m. Rio, which sealed the deal back in January, expects the acquisition to close shortly.Ferrochrome producer International Ferrochrome slid into a second half net deficit of R341m as a slump in demand and prices prompted severe production cutbacks. The cut back in production caused sales to fall from 207,862 tonnes last year to 101,835 tonnes this year, with a consequential deterioration in economies of scale, the firm said.Kentz has had a ‘strong’ first half during which profit jumped 10% to more than $1bn as the engineering group focused on oil and gas, petrochemicals and energy in developing regions. Profit before tax for the six months ending 30 June 2009 rose to $18.5m from $16.8m a year earlier on revenue little changed at $328.9m.Construction and regeneration group Morgan Sindall has won a £38m private/public partnership (PPP) scheme contract to build Basildon Sporting Village, a state of the art leisure complex. Energy meter provider Bglobal has won a contract to provide the UK retail arm of Russian energy company Gazprom with smart metering services.