London pre-open: Stocks seen lower as China concerns grow

London stocks are set to open lower on Thursday following another dismal session in Asia, where trading in China was halted again after the Shanghai Composite fell over 7%.

The FTSE 100 is expected to start 78 points lower than Wednesday’s close at 5,995.

“In China circuit breakers were triggered and trading halted for the day after just 15 minutes of frantic trading. That short space of time was enough for $640bn to be wiped off stocks leaving the Shanghai composite index down 7.3%,” said Farbod Mimeh, a dealer at London Capital Group.

On the data front, there are no major UK releases due so eyes will turn to the US, where initial jobless claims are slated for release at 1330 GMT.

Marks & Spencer CEO Marc Bolland to step down

While unveiling a mixed third-quarter trading update, Marks and Spencer chief executive Mark Bolland announced he will retire this year and hand the baton to merchandise chief Steve Rowe.

While M&S enjoyed its best ever Christmas for food sales, with total sales up 3.7% and like-for-like (LFL) sales up 0.4%, general merchandise LFL sales slumped 5.8%.

Aircraft were emptier at easyJet in December, as the Luton-based airline felt the effects of a French leisure market muted by terrorism.

The FTSE 100 firm flew 4,848,258 passengers in December 2015, up from 4,634,977 a year earlier - an increase of 4.6%.

EasyJet's load factor was down, however, by 1.8 percentage points, from 88.4% in December 2014 to 86.6% last month.

The airline blamed this poorer load performance on the terror attacks in Paris in mid-November.

Persimmon said on Thursday that full year revenues were up 13% for 2015, driven by strong growth in the number of completed new homes for the year.

The FTSE 100 housebuilder posted a trading update ahead of its full results out next month.

Full year revenue came in at £2.9bn, up from£2.6bn in 2014, with the group’s average selling price up by 4.5% to around £199,100.

That was driven by an 8% increase in new builds for the year, completing 14,572 homes in 2015 compared with 13,509 in 2014.

The company also saw a stronger second half, with 7,717 homes being finished between July and December.