Sector movers: BP leads oil shares higher

5th Jul 2010 14:11

Oil & gas producers are on the rise today. BP is the strongest blue chip on reports that the governments of Kuwait, China and Singapore could inject funds under a £6bn plan designed to shore up the oil group's finances in the wake of the Gulf disaster. The cost of the clean-up has now exceeded $3bn.Elsewhere in the sector, Premier Oil has upgraded reserves estimates for Catcher and Catcher East to between 60mn barrels of oil (mmbls) and 100 mmbbls after striking oil again at the lucrative field in the UK Central North Sea. Premier and other stakeholders in Catcher - Encore Oil (15%- operator), Nautical Petroleum (15%), Wintershall (UK North Sea) Limited (20%) and Agora Oil & Gas (15%) - are looking to buy "a number" of new site surveys over potential drilling locations in Block 28/9. Investors in Falkland Oil and Gas hungry for news on the Toroa F61/5-1 exploration well will have to wait an extra week due to "minor operational issues and weather related downtime".Ahead of its first quarter trading update on Wednesday retailer Marks & Spencer is wanted, as is clothing store Next.Markets are fretting once more about a slow-down in global economic growth, and this has put miners African Barrick Gold, Rio Tinto, Xstrata and BHP Billiton under pressure.Top performing sectors so far todayOil & Gas Producers 6,285.80 +1.48%Food & Drug Retailers 4,443.79 +1.29%General Retailers 1,527.04 +1.23%Tobacco 25,406.98 +1.00%Industrial Transportation 2,184.38 +0.93%Bottom performing sectors so far todayAlternative Energy 4,374.00 -3.81%Mining 18,416.91 -1.57%Pharmaceuticals & Biotechnology 8,304.09 -0.82%Industrial Metals & Mining 4,991.31 -0.72%Banks 4,357.38 -0.57%