London midday: Stocks decline as oil price rally ends

The FTSE 100 had erased early morning gains by midday on Thursday as the rally in oil prices snapped.

London’s top tier equities index fell 0.07% at 1202 BST.

Oil prices reversed the increases seen through Wednesday and the following morning as hopes of a deal on a global production freeze receded ahead of a meeting on 17 April.

At 1154 Brent crude fell 0.02% to $39.83 per barrel and West Texas Intermediate slid 0.15% to $37.69 per barrel.

Meanwhile, the market continued to digest the minutes from the Federal Reserve’s latest policy meeting.

The minutes of the 15-16 March meeting showed several policymakers argued against an interest rate hike in April amid the threat of slower global growth and low inflation.

However, others said an April rate increase was a possibility if economic data showed improvement in the moderate growth in output, further strengthening of the labour market, and inflation rising to 2% over the medium term.

“What many expected or wanted to see did come out in these minutes, but the matter of concern is that Fed members failed to show a solid front and came out looking fragmented, said Naeem Aslam, chief market analyst at Ava Trade.

Attention now turns to the European Central Bank as it releases its account of the 10 March policy meeting at 1230 BST. The account will outline more details of the meeting which resulted in the decision to introduce raft of new measures including the expansion of its asset purchase programme and cuts to interest rates, the deposit facility rate and the marginal lending facility rate.

Closer to home, Halifax revealed UK house prices rose 2.6% month-on-month in March, as second home owners and buy-to-let investors rushed in to purchase homes ahead of higher stamp duty charges in April. It compared to a 1.5% drop in February and beat analysts’ forecasts of 0.9%.

Elsewhere, Chinese stocks declined on concerns that a three-month ban on large shareholders selling more than 1% of a company’s total shares is about to expire. Worries that it will prompt a barrage of selling pressuring the overall market weighed on Chinese equities.

Among corporate stocks, Marks & Spencer shares rallied after the retailer reported fourth quarter sales that exceeded analysts’ estimates as sales at the troubled general merchandise unit fell less than anticipated.

Shire gained after saying it expected its $32bn (£22.6bn) merger with Baxalta to go ahead despite new US tax rules stopping the $160bn deal between Pfizer and Allergan.

Victrex, which specialises in high performance polymer solutions, declined after it reported a drop in first half revenue.

Dunelm jumped after the home furnishings retailer reported total revenue for the third quarter increased 5.9%.

Gold miner Centamin advanced as it said first quarter production from its Sukari operation in Egypt rose 6.5% compared with the previous period to 125,268 ounces.

Education giant Pearson slumped as its shares went ex-dividend.

Market Movers

FTSE 100 (UKX) 6,159.55 -0.03%
FTSE 250 (MCX) 16,832.07 -0.20%
techMARK (TASX) 3,155.52 0.37%

FTSE 100 - Risers

Marks & Spencer Group (MKS) 434.00p 3.24%
Randgold Resources Ltd. (RRS) 6,510.00p 2.20%
Sainsbury (J) (SBRY) 285.00p 1.89%
ARM Holdings (ARM) 1,047.00p 1.75%
United Utilities Group (UU.) 943.50p 1.51%
AstraZeneca (AZN) 4,188.00p 1.47%
TUI AG Reg Shs (DI) (TUI) 1,058.00p 1.24%
Severn Trent (SVT) 2,206.00p 1.01%
Kingfisher (KGF) 381.50p 1.01%
Diageo (DGE) 1,922.50p 0.89%

FTSE 100 - Fallers

Pearson (PSON) 825.00p -4.95%
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 65.47p -3.83%
Berkeley Group Holdings (The) (BKG) 3,198.00p -3.56%
Aviva (AV.) 427.40p -3.30%
Glencore (GLEN) 136.75p -2.39%
Taylor Wimpey (TW.) 189.40p -2.22%
Worldpay Group (WI) (WPG) 276.60p -2.19%
Barratt Developments (BDEV) 559.00p -2.10%
Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 204.70p -2.06%
Rexam (REX) 622.00p -2.05%

FTSE 250 - Risers

Centamin (DI) (CEY) 96.55p 6.63%
St. Modwen Properties (SMP) 312.10p 3.69%
Dunelm Group (DNLM) 943.00p 3.63%
AA (AA.) 266.90p 3.53%
Indivior (INDV) 172.20p 3.24%
NMC Health (NMC) 1,112.00p 3.15%
Evraz (EVR) 91.55p 2.87%
CLS Holdings (CLI) 1,527.00p 2.14%
FirstGroup (FGP) 98.60p 1.81%
Genus (GNS) 1,537.00p 1.79%

FTSE 250 - Fallers

Kaz Minerals (KAZ) 149.20p -6.69%
Vesuvius (VSVS) 297.70p -5.07%
International Personal Finance (IPF) 270.30p -3.67%
Victrex plc (VCT) 1,515.00p -3.56%
BBA Aviation (BBA) 192.00p -3.37%
Melrose Industries (MRO) 345.00p -2.82%
Aldermore Group (ALD) 200.40p -2.77%
Ultra Electronics Holdings (ULE) 1,751.00p -2.45%
Phoenix Group Holdings (DI) (PHNX) 912.50p -2.30%
ICAP (IAP) 459.90p -2.21%