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London open: Stocks in the black but Hiscox bucks trend on Harvey estimates
London stocks edged higher in early trade on Monday, taking their cue from a positive session in Asia.
At 0825 BST, the FTSE 100 was up 0.5% to 7,253.01, while the pound was flat against the euro at 1.1375 and down 0.3% versus the dollar at 1.3558.
“Having been battered in the wake of last week’s sterling super surge, the FTSE is using a quiet Monday morning to claw back some of its losses,” said analyst Connor Campbell of Spreadex.
“The upcoming week isn’t the most exciting, especially when compared to last week’s data banquet. Nevertheless it does feature the kind of Wednesday that could really test cable’s current levels, with a UK retail sales reading in the morning followed by the evening’s September Fed meeting, where Janet Yellen and co are set to announce the reduction of its hefty balance sheet.”
In corporate news, Dairy Crest Group was in the black after saying cheese sales volumes and values in the six months to September are ahead of last year, with profit also increased, while BAE Systems advanced on news that Qatar’s defence minister has signed a letter of intent to buy 24 Typhoon jets from the company.
Esure was also trading higher following press reports that founder Sir Peter Wood is planning to sell his controlling stake in the insurer.
On the downside, insurer Hiscox was in the red after saying it expects to see claims of around $150m as a result of Hurricane Harvey. It said this was within the group’s modelled range for an event of this nature and added that reinsurance protections remain “substantially intact”.
Petra Diamonds shares tumbled after it reported a 4% drop in full-year adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation and warned that restrictions on exports from Tanzania after the seizure of some of its diamonds could dent its lending facilities.
IP Group retreated after saying it has extended the takeover offer for Touchstone Innovations to 6 October and that it had secured support from Touchstone shareholders with a combined 96.5% stake in the company.
Investors were also digesting the latest figures from Rightmove, which showed average UK asking prices fell in September, dragged lower by a big drop in the capital.
The average UK asking price fell by 1.2% on the month in September to £310,000 following a 0.9% decline in August, with asking prices in the capital down 2.9%. This marked the first monthly fall at this time of year since 2013.
Rightmove said that excluding London, the decline would have been a much smaller 0.5%. It added that London’s higher-end boroughs were seeing the biggest drops, with falls in five out of the six most expensive.
