By Khushi Singh and Bansari Mayur Kamdar
(Reuters) -The UK's FTSE 100 declined on Thursday as Standard Chartered (LON:STAN) led a slide in bank stocks and Unilever (LON:ULVR) led a drop in consumer shares after the two blue-chip companies posted disappointing earnings.
The FTSE 100 closed 0.8% lower, while the mid-cap FTSE 250 slid 0.5%.
Shares of Standard Chartered dropped 12.4% to the bottom of FTSE 100 after the UK lender reported a 33% tumble in third-quarter pre-tax profit due to a nearly $1 billion hit from exposure to China's banking and troubled real estate sectors.
The broader banks index slid 1.8%.
Unilever's new boss Hein Schumacher laid out long-awaited plans to simplify the business after admitting it had underperformed in recent years, but its shares fell 2.8% as some investors were unimpressed.
"Between higher interest rates and inflation that continues to remain high, companies are being hit heavily," said Daniela Hathorn, senior market analyst, at Capital.com.
WPP (LON:WPP), the world's largest ad group, cut its full-year outlook for the second quarter in a row, taking its shares down 1.0%.
Renishaw (LON:RSW) fell 2.2% after the British engineering company posted a drop in quarterly profit and revenue.
A survey published by U.S. bank Citi showed the British public's expectations for year-ahead inflation continued to ease in September.
Meanwhile, another set of data showed Britain's car output in September rose nearly 40% year-over-year, driven by an uptick in export demand.
Pest control maker Rentokil fell for the tenth straight day, down 10.6%, as traders kept selling after last week when the company warned of weakness in its biggest market, North America