London’s FTSE 100 was up 0.2% at 7,033.69 in afternoon trade on Monday.
Sainsbury’s and Ocado got a boost after FTSE 250 peer Morrisons said it had rebuffed an unsolicited £5.5bn bid over the weekend from the US private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, which had offered to pay 230p a share in cash.
Online supermarket Ocado was also lifted by an upgrade to ‘overweight’ from ‘equalweight’ at Morgan Stanley following a selloff. The bank said that with the shares now down 34% since the peak in September, near-term risks are priced in.
Miner Rio Tinto was under the cosh after UBS downgraded the shares to ‘sell’ from ‘neutral’ as it argued that iron ore is approaching an inflection point.
SSE was also weaker after Jefferies cut the stock to ‘hold’ from ‘buy’.
“With the company indicating it will update the market on its capex plans in November, we believe it is likely its FY21-25 capex target of £7.5bn will be upgraded, and see £8.6bn as a reasonable estimate,” Jefferies said, adding that this could leave the balance sheet stretched.
FTSE 100 – Risers
Sainsbury (J) (SBRY) 270.00p 3.81%
Ocado Group (OCDO) 1,938.50p 3.06%
Evraz (EVR) 618.80p 2.93%
Kingfisher (KGF) 354.90p 2.37%
Weir Group (WEIR) 1,879.50p 2.09%
Burberry Group (BRBY) 2,221.00p 1.88%
Taylor Wimpey (TW.) 163.45p 1.71%
CRH (CDI) (CRH) 3,618.00p 1.60%
Anglo American (AAL) 2,757.00p 1.45%
Intermediate Capital Group (ICP) 2,145.00p 1.42%
FTSE 100 – Fallers
Schroders (SDR) 3,515.00p -1.26%
Associated British Foods (ABF) 2,253.00p -1.23%
Hikma Pharmaceuticals (HIK) 2,360.00p -1.13%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 5,744.00p -1.12%
Admiral Group (ADM) 3,177.00p -1.00%
Compass Group (CPG) 1,559.00p -0.92%
Next (NXT) 7,730.00p -0.80%
NATWEST GROUP PLC ORD 100P (NWG) 200.40p -0.79%
SSE (SSE) 1,516.00p -0.69%
HSBC Holdings (HSBA) 426.55p -0.66%
