FTSE 100 movers: Miners drive market down, led by Antofagasta

The FTSE 100 sank further on Tuesday, with the blue-chip market down 75.98 points (1.34%) to 5,613.38 by mid-afternoon.

Antofagasta led the fallers after Goldman Sachs downgraded the stock to ‘sell’ from ‘neutral’ and slashed the price target to 250p from 440p on the back of lower copper price forecasts.

The GS commodities team forecasts full year 2016/17/18 copper prices of $4,340/4,000/4,200/t, from $4,725/4,500/4,500/t. The bank said that on its forecasts, Antofagasta currently trades at a significant premium both to its historical levels and its peers.

“We believe Antofagasta’s latest FY16 production guidance reflects declining grades at its flagship mines, while its cost guidance reflects little by way of cost savings, apart from the benefit of a depreciating Chilean peso versus the US dollar.” Goldman highlighted several catalysts it reckons will cause the stock to underperform. These included declining grades at its flagship mines Los Pelambres and Centinela over the short term, leading to lower production and structurally higher costs, and potential operational issues during the Antucoya ramp-up and Encuentro Oxide start up. In addition, it pointed to a lack of production growth post 2016 without significant capex, consensus earnings downgrades driven by declining copper prices, and lacklustre dividend yields.

Despite a positive outlook from RBC Capital Markets, Glencore shares sank throughout the day. The investment bank upgraded the company from ‘sector perform’ to ‘outperform’ and had its target price raised from 115p to 135p.

It said in a note that the miner has taken steps in response to a lack of market confidence last year. “Equity has been raised, costs have been cut significantly, capex spending has been cut back, the dividend has been cancelled, production has been cut, the 12-month RCF is being refinanced early, and finally, the divestment/deleveraging process is well advanced.”

However, RBC Capital Markets did point out there are still quite a few risks. “We highlight a further deterioration of commodity fundamentals could see the loss of the investment grade credit rating. Although we see more flexibility in the GLEN balance sheet than before, we remain cautious on how GLEN's business model would endure markedly lower prices.”

Anglo American and Rio Tinto also saw big falls after Goldman Sachs retained its ‘sell’ rating on the miners, saying it sees the commodity mix of both remaining challenged, putting further pressure on their balance sheets.

On the other side of the ledger, Next was a big riser while Kingfisher’s shares were in positive territory after data from the BRC-KPMG Retail Sales Monitor showed total retail sales for January were up 3.3%. It was the best monthly growth since September, firmly ahead of the three-month average of 1.6% and the 12-month average of 1.9%.

Adjusted for the BRC-Nielsen Shop Price Index deflation, total growth was 5.1%. Furniture was the strongest category in the traditionally important sales month, with clothing surging after a weak Christmas, and all product categories apart from food contributing to the growth.

Following on from a somewhat disappointing Christmas period for retailers, the new year kicked off to a strong start, said the BRC's chief executive Helen Dickinson. "This was the best performance for retailers since September and ahead of the three and twelve month averages." She noted that after seeing a slight recovery in December, food sales were once again slightly down in January, while the mildly positive longer term trends were unchanged. “Retailers will welcome the positive start to what will be a momentous year for the industry," she said.

More sales data also sent shares in Tesco up, but this time from Kantar Worldpanel. Figures for the 12 weeks to 31 January 2016 show take-home sales increased 0.2% compared to the previous year, driven by New Year resolutions to eat healthy.

“Consumers are clearly striving for a healthier start to the year and have turned to fresh foods – particularly fruit and vegetables, which have both grown sales by 5%,” said Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar Worldpanel.

“Given that they’re still experiencing like-for-like deflation it’s a significant revenue growth for both categories, shared across both traditional and discount retailers.” While Tesco’s revenues fell 1.6% for the period, it was the best set of numbers from the retailer since September 2015.

FTSE 100 - Risers

Next (NXT) 6,545.00p 1.79%
WPP (WPP) 1,353.00p 1.12%
ARM Holdings (ARM) 929.00p 0.98%
Wolseley (WOS) 3,261.00p 0.96%
Kingfisher (KGF) 316.60p 0.60%
easyJet (EZJ) 1,477.00p 0.54%
Whitbread (WTB) 3,671.00p 0.49%
Tesco (TSCO) 173.30p 0.41%
Merlin Entertainments (MERL) 381.30p 0.39%
Relx plc (REL) 1,129.00p 0.27%

FTSE 100 - Fallers

Antofagasta (ANTO) 414.90p -8.49%
Anglo American (AAL) 346.40p -7.90%
Glencore (GLEN) 95.22p -7.37%
BHP Billiton (BLT) 663.30p -6.25%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 1,729.50p -6.03%
Barclays (BARC) 155.90p -4.88%
Standard Chartered (STAN) 406.75p -4.74%
London Stock Exchange Group (LSE) 2,097.00p -4.55%
Worldpay Group (WI) (WPG) 265.50p -3.66%
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 57.23p -3.59%