The FTSE 100 recovers some ground early on Thursday, up 0.17% to 7,546.48, ahead of purchasing managers’ index data on the UK manufacturing sector out later this morning and after Nationwide’s latest figures showed faster than expected growth in house prices.
Several big corporate names have announcements out this morning. Oil major Royal Dutch Shell (RDSB) slips 1.3% to £24.64 as a narrow beat of consensus earnings forecasts in the fourth quarter isn’t enough to impress the market. Expectations had been raised after an increase in the oil price to $70 per barrel earlier this year and the market may also have been disappointed by its downstream arm falling short of analysts’ estimates.
Consumer goods giant Unilever (ULVR) ticks up 0.5% to £40.20 as it hits full year growth targets off the back of a strong final quarter. Underlying sales growth in the final three months of 2017 came in ahead of the 3.7% expected by the market at 4.3%.
Mobile telecoms firm Vodafone (VOD) slips 0.9% to 222.5p despite reporting it was on track to meet annual profit forecasts after trading in line for the third quarter. Investors clearly unimpressed by a 3.6% decline in revenue for the three-month period to €11.8bn - attributed to the divestment of its Dutch operations and the impact of currency movements.
Consultancy firm RPS (RPS) dives 12% to 256.5p as it warns of a weaker than expected performance in its energy business on which it plans to take an impairment charge of £40m.
On AIM X-ray screening systems specialist Image Scan (IGE:AIM) dives 38.2% to 4.25p as the cancellation of a £1m export order leads it to guide for its September 2018 performance to be ‘materially below’ expectations.
