London’s FTSE 100 was down 0.4% at 7,221.39 in afternoon trade on Friday.
NatWest slumped despite reporting a surge in third-quarter profits as it released £242m set aside to cover bad loans during the Covid crisis. The bank said operating pre-tax profits rose to £1.07bn from £355m a year ago, but lower than the £1.5bn in the second quarter.
CMC Markets analyst Michael Hewson said: “Having seen decent numbers from Lloyds and Barclays, expectations were high for NatWest Group’s Q3 numbers today.
“NatWest share price has been a notable outperformer so far this year, its shares up over 35%, and at 20-month highs, so the bar was quite high for today’s Q3 numbers, and quite frankly the market reaction has been a little underwhelming.”
Medical equipment maker Smith & Nephew was also weaker after US peer Stryker cautioned that staffing issues and rising Covid cases were holding back a recovery in medical procedures.
On the upside, cybersecurity firm Darktrace was the standout gainer, having been on the slide since Peel Hunt initiated coverage of the stock at ‘sell’ on Monday.
FTSE 100 – Risers
Darktrace (DARK) 801.00p 2.76%
ITV (ITV) 106.40p 2.06%
Barclays (BARC) 202.20p 1.47%
Kingfisher (KGF) 335.90p 1.39%
Royal Mail (RMG) 423.40p 1.29%
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 50.20p 1.25%
Standard Chartered (STAN) 494.60p 1.25%
Pershing Square Holdings Ltd NPV (PSH) 2,940.00p 1.20%
Bunzl (BNZL) 2,705.00p 0.63%
Intertek Group (ITRK) 4,886.00p 0.60%
FTSE 100 – Fallers
NATWEST GROUP PLC ORD 100P (NWG) 221.00p -4.49%
Smith & Nephew (SN.) 1,240.50p -3.73%
Evraz (EVR) 609.60p -2.96%
Polymetal International (POLY) 1,357.00p -2.37%
SEGRO (SGRO) 1,290.50p -2.23%
Whitbread (WTB) 3,259.00p -2.01%
Flutter Entertainment (CDI) (FLTR) 13,740.00p -1.89%
SSE (SSE) 1,651.00p -1.84%
Royal Dutch Shell ‘A’ (RDSA) 1,684.40p -1.68%
Rightmove (RMV) 690.60p -1.57%
