London’s FTSE 100 was down 1.3% at 7,314.11 in afternoon trade on Friday.
BT Group lost ground as its Openreach business confirmed it will hold back the launch of its ‘Equinox 2’ pricing deal after Ofcom delayed the conclusion of its investigation into the new broadband pricing plan by two months.
Ofcom’s probe finished on March 4, and it had planned to make a final ruling by the end of the month, but said it had received a number of detailed responses to the consultation, some of which raised “issues which require further assessment”.
On the upside, miners Glencore and Anglo American rallied as metals prices rose.
London Stock Exchange was also in the black after an upgrade to ‘buy’ from ‘hold’ at UBS.
GSK ticked higher after an upgrade to ‘buy’ from ‘hold’ at Deutsche Bank, which hiked its price target to 1,700p from 1,500p.
FTSE 100 – Risers
Endeavour Mining (EDV) 1,752.00p 1.98%
Fresnillo (FRES) 709.80p 1.72%
Glencore (GLEN) 429.90p 1.58%
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) 7,402.00p 1.04%
Imperial Brands (IMB) 1,881.00p 0.99%
Compass Group (CPG) 1,937.50p 0.57%
GSK (GSK) 1,394.80p 0.56%
Anglo American (AAL) 2,488.50p 0.38%
Experian (EXPN) 2,661.00p 0.30%
Pearson (PSON) 838.00p 0.00%
FTSE 100 – Fallers
Abrdn (ABDN) 198.00p -6.16%
BT Group (BT.A) 137.70p -6.10%
Ocado Group (OCDO) 410.70p -5.72%
Rolls-Royce Holdings (RR.) 139.82p -4.43%
Prudential (PRU) 1,003.50p -4.38%
Hiscox Limited (DI) (HSX) 1,049.50p -4.16%
M&G (MNG) 174.25p -4.07%
Smurfit Kappa Group (CDI) (SKG) 2,819.00p -3.79%
Legal & General Group (LGEN) 226.30p -3.46%
Standard Chartered (STAN) 628.00p -3.44%
