There are surprisingly few major stock market announcements in early trade on Tuesday to welcome back investors following the Easter holidays.

Grey and wet weather during the extended bank holiday is doing little to lift the negative mood on UK high streets. Share prices of large retail chains, including Marks & Spencer (MKS), Next (NXT) and Associated British Foods (ABF), which owns the Primark discount chain, all chalk-up declines of between 1% and 2% in early trade.

It is a similarly story for the UK’s three major listed supermarket groups, Tesco (TSCO) and Sainsbury (SBRY) both down but led by the near 1% fall to 211.4p of peer Morrisons (MRW).

MUTED MARKETS AS UK FOLLOWS US TECHS DECLINES

That, coupled with another day of weak trading across the pond overnight, drags on the FTSE 100 index, which slides by around 50 points, or 0.7%, to 7001.89, just about staying above the 7,000 mark early on Tuesday.

Overnight the US S&P 500 index declines 0.9% to 2,581.88 with heavy-hitter techs stocks (Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Google parent-Alphabet for example) once again coming under selling pressure.

MINERS FIRM EARLY ON

Mining stocks are among the main blue-chip risers on Tuesday, with gold digger Randgold Resources (RRS) heading the leader board with 1.6% rally to £59.78, with Rio Tinto (RIO) and BHP Billiton (BLT) close behind.

Going the other way, investment trust Scottish Mortgage (SMT) heads the FTSE 100 loser board thanks to its hefty exposure to US technology stocks. Its shares decline 2.5% to 431p, followed by aero/auto engineer GKN (GKN), which lost its fight for independence on Thursday as shareholders narrowly backed a takeover by Melrose Industries (MRO).

SKY NEWS SALE ON CARDS

Twenty-First Century Fox says it could legally separate Sky News within the wider Sky (SKY) broadcasting group to allay the concerns of UK regulators about the news service’s continuing independence under Rupert Murdoch’s ownership.

The Murdoch family is trying to buyout the whole of Sky in which it already owns a 39.14% stake.

Sky shares nudge a little more than 1% higher to £13.125.

Budget airline Flybe (FLYB) is bracing investors for bad weather impacts, saying on Tuesday that the cold weather brought by the Beast from the East has cost it around £4m in lost revenue.

The airline minnow warns that the ‘added loss will be reflected in our full year financial results,’ which end on 31 March 2018.

Shares in Flybe drift 1.5% lower to 33p, valuing the business at around £71.5m.

Technology investors in the UK will pause for thought after shock news of the sudden death of Phillip Rasmussen, the long-time chief finance officer at compound chips designer IQE (IQE:AIM).

The highly-respected executive was sadly killed in a cycling accident over the bank holiday weekend. The blow is felt by investors with the stock off by around 5% at 121.9p.

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Issue Date: 03 Apr 2018