The FTSE couldn’t really get anything going on Tuesday, prevented from bursting past 7450 by a China-hit set of miners and some unhelpful earnings updates.
Waking up to the news that the Chinese manufacturing PMI had fallen from 50.5 to 50.1 month-on-month, leaving the sector perilously close to contracting once again, the UK’s mining stocks ducked into the red. Glencore (LON:GLEN), which this morning also cut its 2019 copper production target, was the worst hit, dropping 3%, with Rio Tinto (LON:RIO) and BHP Group both down around 1.5% apiece.
Investors weren’t particularly impressed with Whitbread's (LON:WTB) full year results, the first since the completed sale of Costa Coffee to Coca-Cola (NYSE:KO) in January. While underlying pre-tax profit rose 1.2%, UK like-for-like accommodation sales at Premier Inn were down 0.6%, with an accelerated softening in Q4. The company also highlighted ‘a further weakening in market demand’ since the start of FY20, ‘particularly in the regions where most of Premier Inn’s hotels are located’, news that understandably sent the stock 1.5% lower after the bell.
The FTSE was prevented from tipping into the red, however, by some more warmly received updates elsewhere. Though BP’s first quarter profits slipped from $2.6 billion to $2.4 billion year-on-year, that was nevertheless higher than the $2.3 billion forecast, allowing the oil giant to climb 0.6%.
Standard Chartered (LON:STAN) was arguably the morning’s biggest winner, jumping more than 4% as it rewarded investors with a $1 billion share buyback – its first in more than two decades – following a 10% surge in underling pre-tax profit.
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