Sector movers: Gold miners retreat as banking stocks bounce

Gold miners retreated on Monday following a decline in the price of the yellow metal, but the drop was more than offset by banking sector shares.

The FTSE 100 closed 2.04% or 116.68 points higher at 5824.28, while the FTSE 250 ended 1.92% or 296.79 points higher at 15,728.10. Oil futures posted decent upticks but gold retreated as calm returned to the equities market.

At 1620 GMT, WTI was up 1.22% or 36 cents to $29.80 per barrel, while the Brent front-month oil futures contract was up 1.02% or 34 cents to $33.70 per barrel.

Meanwhile, the gold rally faltered as traders booked profits, with the COMEX closed for the US President’s day holiday. Dubai gold futures were down 1.2% or $15.10 at $1238.80 an ounce.

Selected base metal futures remained in positive territory on the London Metal Exchange with China coming back online following its week-long Lunar New Year holiday break. At 1635 GMT, three-month futures contracts of copper (up 1.7%), primary aluminium (up 1.1%) and nickel (up 5.9%) rose, but lead (down 0.1%), zinc (down 1.2%) and tin (down 1.3%) futures posted declines.

Predictably, gold miners Fresnillo (down 2.62%) and Randgold Resources (down 2.03%) were among the biggest FTSE 100 fallers, while Acacia Mining (down 8.01%) registered a substantial decline on the FTSE 250. The midcap mining firm also posted a revenue dip of 7% in the 12 months to 31 December to $868m (£597.71m), which it blamed on the 8% lower average gold price during the year.

Anglo American (up 5.11%) – due to post its financials on Tuesday – saw a downgrade from Moody’s following the close of trading, while BHP Billiton (down 0.43%) ended marginally in negative territory. Elsewhere, Tullow Oil (up 7.66%) posted decent gains.

Away from resource stocks, Standard Chartered (up 5.61%) led banking stocks higher, as peer HSBC decided to keep its headquarters in London, have mulled over the possibility of moving it to Hong Kong.

Story of the session belonged to Reckitt Benckiser (up 6.79%) as the company posted broad growth in the year to 31 December, despite a year of mixed market conditions. The FTSE 100 consumer goods giant saw total net revenue grow 5% on a constant currency basis to £8.87bn, and like-for-like revenue grow 6%, which exceeded the company's targets.

Reckitt's gross margin expanded during the year by 140 basis points to 59.1%, which the company's board said was driven by mix, commodity costs and cost optimisation initiatives.

British Airways and Iberia’s parent company International Consolidated Airlines Group (IAG) flew higher on Monday after Bank of America Merrill Lynch upgraded its stance on the stock to ‘buy’ from ‘underperform’ with an unchanged price target of 610p.

Finally, software firm Fidessa (up 12.08%) led the FTSE 250 risers, having reported a flat pre-tax profit of £39.1m, although revenue rose 7% to £295.5m, beating consensus expectations of £290m.