London’s FTSE 100 was down 0.6% to 6,707.93 in afternoon trade on Wednesday.
Hargreaves Lansdown was under the cosh after Peter Hargreaves sold £300m of shares, leaving him owning less than 20% of the company he co-founded 30 years ago. Hargreaves said he had sold 19,543,974 of the investment platform’s shares at £15.35 each to institutional investors. After the offering, the self-made billionaire owns 19.8% of the group’s shares.
British American Tobacco was also weaker as it said full-year profits rose but the figure fell short of analysts’ expectations.
On the upside, Rio Tinto was a high riser after it delivered a record dividend to shareholders as soaring iron ore prices last and demand from China drove full-year profits sharply higher. The Anglo-Australian mining giant reported a better-than-expected 20% increase in underlying profit to $12.4bn and declared a total dividend of $5.57 a share against expectations of $4.80.
Other miners were also in the black, with Antofagasta and Glencore also up.
FTSE 100 – Risers
Antofagasta (ANTO) 1,727.50p 5.59%
B&M European Value Retail S.A. (DI) (BME) 603.00p 2.20%
Hikma Pharmaceuticals (HIK) 2,379.00p 1.84%
Rolls-Royce Holdings (RR.) 101.60p 1.66%
National Grid (NG.) 859.80p 1.32%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 6,337.00p 1.23%
Glencore (GLEN) 291.20p 1.11%
SSE (SSE) 1,431.50p 0.92%
Morrison (Wm) Supermarkets (MRW) 172.95p 0.90%
Standard Chartered (STAN) 492.80p 0.90%
FTSE 100 – Fallers
Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) 1,551.00p -6.17%
M&G (MNG) 188.45p -4.49%
British American Tobacco (BATS) 2,651.50p -3.53%
International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (CDI) (IAG) 157.05p -3.06%
Polymetal International (POLY) 1,561.00p -2.98%
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) 4,999.00p -2.86%
NATWEST GROUP PLC ORD 100P (NWG) 176.25p -2.81%
St James’s Place (STJ) 1,210.50p -2.81%
Taylor Wimpey (TW.) 160.95p -2.81%
Whitbread (WTB) 3,338.00p -2.65%
