FTSE 100 movers: Miners rally but Whitbread drops on Costa concerns

London’s FTSE 100 was up 0.8% to 7,043.33 in afternoon trade.

Glencore racked up strong gains, hitting a 15-month high after it emerged the company had agreed a much-improved coal deal with an important Japanese buyer.

The mining and commodities trading behemoth secured a price just shy of $95 per tonne for high-quality thermal coal from Tohoku Electric, close to a 50% improvement on the price one year ago, the Financial Times reported overnight.

Anglo American was also in the black after it delivered a third-quarter production report showing increased diamond, nickel and iron ore output and lower copper in-line with expectations, with full-year guidance mostly reiterated.

Chief executive Mark Cutifani said operational improvements across the portfolio were the main reason for the healthy report, with a 4% production increase on a copper equivalent basis in the third quarter.

St James’s Place rallied after reporting a 21% rise in gross inflows for the latest three-month stretch to reach £2.8bn, with the political uncertainty after the referendum not having had any distinguishable impact on its day-to-day business.

On the downside, Whitbread was weaker. The company sprinkled a 5% dividend hike on a strong set of interim results, but investors overlooked acceleration at the Premier Inn hotels arm to focus on a dip in profits from Costa coffee shops.

Operating profits at Costa were down 4.0% due to investments in the stores and IT and the early introduction of the National Living Wage, and not helped by rising coffee prices and a decline in the nascent China operation.

Intu Properties was also in the red after saying it saw strong demand from retailers for new long-term leases between 1 July and 25 October amid brisk footfall at its properties, but warning that new rental incomes might grow more slowly in 2017.

GKN fell after posting slower growth and lower trading margins for the nine months to the end of September, while Standard Chartered slipped after RBC Capital Markets downgraded the stock to ‘underperform’ from ‘sector perform’.

FTSE 100 - Risers

Glencore (GLEN) 248.50p 4.59%
Anglo American (AAL) 1,114.00p 4.55%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 544.00p 3.62%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 2,760.50p 3.18%
BT Group (BT.A) 389.65p 3.16%
St James's Place (STJ) 974.50p 2.69%
Randgold Resources Ltd. (RRS) 7,115.00p 1.86%
BHP Billiton (BLT) 1,246.00p 1.80%
Vodafone Group (VOD) 227.40p 1.79%
Relx plc (REL) 1,458.00p 1.18%

FTSE 100 - Fallers

Whitbread (WTB) 3,699.00p -3.75%
Intu Properties (INTU) 285.00p -2.13%
GKN (GKN) 316.90p -1.95%
Travis Perkins (TPK) 1,370.00p -1.58%
Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 185.20p -1.49%
Standard Chartered (STAN) 702.50p -1.32%
International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (CDI) (IAG) 399.50p -1.31%
Next (NXT) 4,748.00p -1.23%
Carnival (CCL) 3,773.00p -0.84%
Barratt Developments (BDEV) 471.70p -0.82%