FTSE 100 movers: Anglo surges as miners rise

The FTSE 100 had turned things around on Thursday, with the blue chip market in the green by mid-afternoon for the first time this week, up 33.66 points (0.58%) to 5,870.80.

Pharmaceuticals & Biotechnology

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15:45 15/11/24

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Miners were the biggest risers of the day as commodity prices rose as well as Asian stocks. Anglo American, Antofagasta, BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, Glencore and Fresnillo all saw large gains as a result.

Weaker-than-anticipated service sector data out of the United States put pressure on the greenback, which led to gains for commodities overnight extending into the Asian trading day. There was speculation in the People's Republic that "the Fed may only increase interest rates twice this year, largely down from previous market expectations", said Guodu Secutiries analyst Xiao Shijun, leading to the lift in Chinese stocks.

Anglo American also benefitted from an announcement from South32, which it has a joint venture with, that the miner decided to cut costs and production at its South Africa manganese operations, with 620 jobs axed and an expected 0.9m tons (Mt) removed from the market.

The company said that as a result of its write-downs of forecast commodity demand and prices, it now expects to book pre-tax, non-cash charges of approximately $1.7bn in the half-year to December 2015.

After the strategic review of the 60%-owned Samancor manganaese joint venture with Anglo American, the largest in the world, S32 said it had decided to “maximise value rather than volume”. Mining will restart with immediate effect, but at a substantially reduced rate and with greater flexibility, with the Hotazel mines ramping up to a saleable production rate of 2.9Mtpa. This will cut 23% of saleable production from the global market "for the foreseeable future".

Despite Royal Dutch Shell posting an 80% drop in full year profit, the company's A and B shares were up as investors knew last month what was coming and are eyeing up continued dividends.

The oil giant said full year profit dropped to $3.8bn (£2.6bn) from $19bn in 2014. In the fourth quarter, profit was $1.8bn, up from a loss in the third quarter of £6.1bn but down from the profit in the last quarter of 2014 of $4.2bn. Earnings from its upstream business were affected by lower oil and gas prices, however that was partly offset from lower costs. The company also confirmed it will pay a fourth quarter dividend of $0.47 per share, and said it is expecting to announce a first quarter dividend at the same rate. CMC Markets' Michael Hewson said the results meet expectations as investors look for the dividend. "This morning’s results from Royal Dutch Shell didn’t offer up too many surprises given that CEO Ben Van Buerden gave investors a “heads up” at the end of January," he said.

On the other side of the ledger, Astrazeneca's shares dropped after warning that the expiry of the patent on its anti-cholesterol drug Crestor will cut its profits this year on competition from cheaper generic versions.

The company said it sees a low to mid single-digit percentage decline in both sales and profits in 2016 as it reported its full year results for 2015. Astrazeneca expects to lose exclusive rights to Crestor, one of the world's leading statins, in May. Crestor achieved global sales of more than $5bn (£3.4bn) last year, surpassing other AstraZeneca drugs. "As we face the transitional period of patent expiry for Crestor in the US, we're confident that our strong execution on strategy, combined with the benefits of focused investments and new launches, keeps us on track to return to sustainable growth in line with our targets," said chief executive Pascal Soriot.

EasyJet shares also dipped after it said its load factor for January, which gauges how many seats were actually taken up on flights, nudged down to 85% from 85.1%.

The budget airline said passenger numbers rose 6.3% compared with the same month in 2015 to 4.28m. On a rolling 12-month basis, passenger numbers grew 7.2% to 70.08m and the load factor edged up to 91.6% from 90.8%. In January, EasyJet said the Sharm el-Sheikh disaster and the terror attacks in Paris hit its revenue for the three months to the end of December. The airline said the events resulted in lower demand and yield in November and December, offsetting a strong revenue per seat performance in October.

FTSE 100 - Risers

Anglo American (AAL) 315.50p 15.27%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 403.50p 7.43%
BHP Billiton (BLT) 689.70p 7.23%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 1,802.50p 6.97%
Royal Dutch Shell 'A' (RDSA) 1,527.00p 6.19%
Glencore (GLEN) 91.26p 6.18%
Royal Dutch Shell 'B' (RDSB) 1,524.50p 6.05%
Old Mutual (OML) 158.60p 4.14%
BG Group (BG.) 1,058.50p 4.13%
Fresnillo (FRES) 751.00p 4.02%