London open: Stocks fall after disappointing US earnings; NatWest in the red
London stocks fell in early trade on Friday following disappointing earnings from Apple and Amazon overnight, with NatWest under the cosh after its latest results.
At 0825 BST, the FTSE 100 was down 0.8% at 7,193.29.
Oanda market analyst Jeffrey Halley said: "Asian markets were handed a Wall Street hospital pass this morning as Apple and Amazon both missed quarterly earnings expectations in after-market announcements.
"Rising labour costs, rising input costs, supply chain disruptions, semi-conductor disruptions were all rolled out as the usual suspects."
In UK equity markets, NatWest Bank 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."
Glencore fell even as the mining giant said it expected annual earnings to beat the top end of guidance and maintained production forecasts. The company forecast earnings before interest and tax at its marketing unit to exceed the top end of its $2.2bn to $3.2bn long-term guidance.
Computacenter nudged lower despite saying it was on course to deliver record revenue, profit and earning per share for the full year after the third quarter ended "marginally above" its expectations.
On the upside, Hilton Food advanced after announcing the acquisition of UK foodservice meat supplier Fairfax Meadow Europe for £23.8m.
Medical products company ConvaTec rallied as it said full-year organic revenue growth was set to be towards the upper end of its guidance range after an in-line third-quarter, which saw sales slow from the second quarter.
Market Movers
FTSE 100 (UKX) 7,193.29 -0.77%
FTSE 250 (MCX) 23,139.48 -0.26%
techMARK (TASX) 4,548.20 -0.58%
FTSE 100 - Risers
International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (CDI) (IAG) 164.28p 1.34%
Rolls-Royce Holdings (RR.) 132.74p 0.55%
WPP (WPP) 1,049.00p 0.48%
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 49.76p 0.35%
Melrose Industries (MRO) 159.35p 0.22%
Hikma Pharmaceuticals (HIK) 2,441.00p 0.00%
Meggitt (MGGT) 750.80p 0.00%
BT Group (BT.A) 139.25p 0.00%
ITV (ITV) 104.15p -0.10%
Intermediate Capital Group (ICP) 2,209.00p -0.14%
FTSE 100 - Fallers
NATWEST GROUP PLC ORD 100P (NWG) 221.60p -4.24%
Smith & Nephew (SN.) 1,264.50p -1.86%
Glencore (GLEN) 352.90p -1.81%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 4,522.00p -1.61%
Darktrace (DARK) 767.50p -1.54%
BHP Group (BHP) 1,930.00p -1.39%
Aveva Group (AVV) 3,539.00p -1.34%
Croda International (CRDA) 9,344.00p -1.27%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 1,426.50p -1.11%
Royal Dutch Shell 'A' (RDSA) 1,694.20p -1.11%
FTSE 250 - Risers
Harbour Energy (HBR) 365.00p 4.52%
Convatec Group (CTEC) 203.80p 2.98%
Elementis (ELM) 145.50p 2.97%
Airtel Africa (AAF) 112.80p 2.55%
Just Group (JUST) 94.70p 2.16%
Centrica (CNA) 61.66p 2.12%
Watches of Switzerland Group (WOSG) 1,128.00p 1.08%
Drax Group (DRX) 536.00p 1.04%
Network International Holdings (NETW) 340.70p 0.98%
Fidelity Special Values (FSV) 304.50p 0.83%
FTSE 250 - Fallers
Rank Group (RNK) 160.00p -3.03%
Games Workshop Group (GAW) 10,140.00p -2.97%
PureTech Health (PRTC) 340.50p -2.30%
Cranswick (CWK) 3,362.00p -1.75%
Trustpilot Group (TRST) 319.20p -1.48%
easyJet (EZJ) 609.00p -1.46%
Petropavlovsk (POG) 24.12p -1.39%
UK Commercial Property Reit Limited (UKCM) 74.50p -1.32%
Auction Technology Group (ATG) 1,358.00p -1.16%
Big Yellow Group (BYG) 1,470.00p -1.14%