London’s FTSE 100 was flat at 7,551.09 in afternoon trade on Thursday.
BT Group was in the black following a report it is close to agreeing the sale of its sports broadcasting arm to streaming firm Dazn in a deal worth an estimated $800m. According to Reuters, citing four unnamed sources familiar with the matter, the sale of BT Sport to the US sports streaming specialist could be announced as early as February.
On the downside, retailers JD Sports and Next were both in the red, tracking losses for FTSE 250-listed Marks & Spencer, despite it saying it now expects annual profits of at least £500m after strong Christmas sales driven by outperformance in its food range.
Supermarket chain Tesco was also weaker despite lifting annual profits guidance after better-than-expected third-quarter and Christmas sales.
FTSE 100 – Risers
Prudential (PRU) 1,332.50p 2.58%
Pershing Square Holdings Ltd NPV (PSH) 2,945.00p 1.90%
BT Group (BT.A) 177.80p 1.80%
Imperial Brands (IMB) 1,687.50p 1.60%
Barclays (BARC) 215.05p 1.53%
Glencore (GLEN) 407.35p 1.52%
Mondi (MNDI) 1,919.50p 1.45%
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) 7,468.00p 1.44%
HSBC Holdings (HSBA) 508.30p 1.42%
M&G (MNG) 212.90p 1.38%
FTSE 100 – Fallers
JD Sports Fashion (JD.) 198.60p -6.10%
Next (NXT) 7,650.00p -4.40%
Aveva Group (AVV) 3,043.00p -2.78%
Spirax-Sarco Engineering (SPX) 14,195.00p -2.07%
Experian (EXPN) 3,167.00p -1.98%
Sage Group (SGE) 805.00p -1.81%
Intermediate Capital Group (ICP) 1,994.00p -1.72%
Halma (HLMA) 2,844.00p -1.69%
SSE (SSE) 1,584.00p -1.61%
Tesco (TSCO) 287.55p -1.61%
