Sector movers: Electricity and utility stocks lead the rise

2nd Jul 2014 15:30

Negative headlines failed to stop electricity and utility stocks from advancing on Wednesday.One week after regulator Ofgem referred the energy market for a full competition investigation to rebuild consumer trust, investors were largely shrugging off the news of new mis-selling scandals and developments in the 'energy crunch' debate.Shares in Centrica gained today despite the revelation that its British Gas subsidiary is expected to return £500,000 to more than 4,000 customers who have been affected by mis-selling.According to Sky News, sources revealed that the company had overstated potential savings from switching to another tariff from Sainsbury's Energy and British Gas by using inaccurate quotes for the following year's gas and electricity bills.The stock was up 0.5% this afternoon, following a near-7% slump over the past month.Meanwhile, it emerged this week that consumer energy bills would rise by £13 per year in order to fund putting certain power plants on standby to avoid future potential blackouts.However, National Grid (up 0.3%) has been accused by government-appointed experts of exaggerating the risk of blackouts. It is alleged that National Grid, who was tasked to advise the government on the level of capacity needed to ensure supplies, took an "overly conservative" view and "exaggerated" the number of plans that will need the subsidies.Others in the energy and utilities sectors, such as SSE, Drax and IGas Energy, were also performing well today.Top performing sectors so far todayElectricity 10,119.63 +0.87%Banks 4,339.64 +0.72%Automobiles & Parts 8,662.53 +0.52%Real Estate Investment & Services 2,674.74 +0.52%Gas, Water & Multiutilities 6,035.10 +0.46%Bottom performing sectors so far todayIndustrial Transportation 2,930.13 -1.43%Aerospace and Defence 4,956.19 -0.87%Personal Goods 23,314.99 -0.66%Beverages 14,476.34 -0.64%Construction & Materials 4,157.45 -0.64%BC