(Sharecast News) – London’s FTSE 100 was flat at 7,328.37 in afternoon trade on Tuesday.
Rolls-Royce was sitting pretty at the top of the index after an upgrade to ‘overweight’ from ‘equalweight’ at Barclays, which highlighted a “buying opportunity” after the shares de-rated around 10% in the past month.
BP was under the cosh as the oil giant reported a third-quarter underlying replacement cost profit of $3.3bn, an improvement from $2.6bn in the second quarter but down from $8.2bn in the same period a year earlier and missing forecasts of $4bn.
InterContinental Hotels was knocked lower by a downgrade to ‘underweight’ from ‘neutral’ at JPMorgan Cazenove.
In a research note on European hotels, JPM said: “Whilst concerns around weakening demand trends remain on top of investors’ mind, as reflected in recent share price weakness at Whitbread and Accor (both down more than 10% in the last 6 weeks), also exacerbated by potential demand pressure in the Middle-East, we have been surprised by the outperformance of IHG, and now see the risk-reward as highly unappealing.”
Vodafone was in the red as it announced an agreement to sell its Spanish business to Zegona Communications for up to €5bn.
The companies have also entered into an agreement whereby Vodafone will provide certain services to Vodafone Spain for a total annual service charge of around €110m.
FTSE 100 – Risers
Rolls-Royce Holdings (RR.) 212.10p 5.00%
Standard Chartered (STAN) 640.40p 3.22%
SEGRO (SGRO) 712.40p 2.74%
Kingfisher (KGF) 209.80p 2.69%
Smith & Nephew (SN.) 931.40p 2.62%
Croda International (CRDA) 4,371.00p 2.44%
Experian (EXPN) 2,490.00p 2.26%
Entain (ENT) 933.00p 2.10%
Unite Group (UTG) 868.50p 2.06%
Halma (HLMA) 1,854.00p 1.95%
FTSE 100 – Fallers
BP (BP.) 503.10p -4.48%
Airtel Africa (AAF) 112.20p -2.35%
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) 5,880.00p -1.87%
Glencore (GLEN) 443.30p -1.71%
Shell (SHEL) 2,658.00p -1.08%
Ocado Group (OCDO) 458.40p -0.93%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 1,357.00p -0.88%
Vodafone Group (VOD) 76.15p -0.76%
BAE Systems (BA.) 1,095.00p -0.73%
Rightmove (RMV) 478.50p -0.42%
