London pre-open: Stocks seen down on Evergrande worries
London stocks were set to fall at the open on Monday following a weak Asian session, amid growing concerns about Chinese property developer Evergrande.
The FTSE 100 was called to open 20 points lower at 7,007.
Oanda market analyst Jeffrey Halley said: "News that the Hong Kong Stock Exchange has suspended China Evergrande Group shares from trading from today, and related structured products, has put China nerves back front and centre with regional investors.
"Evergrande is has a $260m offshore note maturing today, which only has a five-day ‘grace’ period, and if no sign of payment occurs, the negative noise around the company and China’s property market will increase once again.
"There still remains very little visibility from the Chinese Government over Evergrande’s fate, although a slow and steady dismantling of the company appears to be the favoured course right now. Mainland China is away until Friday, which is rather unfortunate timing, especially if Evergrande misses that note redemption today."
In corporate news, US private equity group Clayton, Dubilier & Rice (CD&R) has won an auction for the UK supermarket chains Morrisons with a £7bn bid. The win was revealed by the Takeover Panel on Saturday.
CD&R offered 287p a share, against a rival bid from Fortress, for 286p per share.
Morrisons chair Andrew Higginson said the final offer from CD&R "represents excellent value for shareholders while at the same time protecting the fundamental character of Morrisons for all stakeholders".