Sector movers: Miners jump on reports of possible Chinese stimulus

Industrial and precious metals miners paced gains on the FTSE 350 after the People's Bank of China cut two key interest rates.

The PBoC cut the rate on its seven-day reverse repurchase operations from 2.0% to 1.9%, as well as its rates on loans through an emergency lending facility.

Miners were also buoyed by a Bloomberg reported, which confirmed a report from earlier in June, that several Chinese government agencies had drafted at least a dozen proposals to support various areas of the country's economy, including its real estate sector and domestic demand.

Further rate cuts were among those measures.

It was believed that China's State Council might discuss the policies as soon as 16 June, but whether or when they might be carried out was unclear.

On the back of the above and a softer-than-expected US CPI report for May published during Tuesday's session, Bloomberg's Commodity Index climbed 1.24%.

July copper futures on COMEX jumped 2.31% to $3.8385/lb., but gold futures slipped 0.53% to $1,959.30/oz.

Going the other way, interest rate sensitive segments of the stock market were lower as the yield on longer-dated Gilts climbed by ten basis points to 4.433%.

Pushing 10-year Gilt yields back towards their 52-week highs, the Office for National Statistics announced a 250,000 jump in employment for the quarter ending in April (consensus: 150,000).

In parallel, cable appreciated by 0.86% to 1.2621.

That helped to cap the rise in the unemployment rate versus the previous month to one tenth of a percentage point to reach 3.8%.

Economists had been anticipating an increase in joblessness to 4.0%.

Top performing sectors so far today

Industrial Metals & Mining 6,646.33 +3.75%

Precious Metals and Mining 11,063.51 +1.86%

Medical Equipment and Services 10,763.40 +1.57%

Industrial Engineering 14,680.83 +1.31%

Travel & Leisure 7,762.00 +1.06%

Bottom performing sectors so far today

Household Goods & Home Construction 10,670.38 -3.12%

Non-life Insurance 3,090.76 -2.89%

Real Estate Investment Trusts 2,136.80 -2.45%

Gas, Water & Multiutilities 5,942.39 -1.07%

Telecommunications Service Providers 2,051.38 -0.97%