Weak Commodity Prices Weigh on FTSE
Trading was light on the London Stock Exchange for this Friday morning, reflecting an uneventful day in New York on Thursday, but energy stocks, nevertheless, bore the brunt of depressed commodity prices.
Dominic Turner
shareprices.com - Friday, July 10, 2009
Crude oil futures dipped below $60 a barrel for the first time in weeks, weakening the big oil majors such as Royal Dutch Shell and BP. Share prices in Royal Dutch Shell fell 10p, or 0.69%, to £14.49, while those in BP fell 2.70p, or 0.58%, to 462.55p. Elsewhere in the oil equipment and services sector, contractor Amec was also down 8p, or 1.29%, at 611.50p. Conversely, beleaguered airline British Airways benefited from falling oil prices, and its share price rose 10p, or 0.08%, to 120p. The voluntary resignation of Fernando Conte, the chairman of Spanish airline Iberia, on Thursday, was expected to provide a fillip for merger talks between the two carriers.
Rio Tinto was one of the biggest fallers in the whole of the FTSE 100, notwithstanding pressure on mining stocks, generally, as it came to light that another of its executives had been detained by the Chinese authorities on allegations of espionage. That took the number of Rio Tinto employees under investigation to four, and spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Qin Gang, cited "conclusive evidence" of stealing state secrets. Shares in the world's second largest mining company fell 1.7%, to £16.34.
Overall, the FTSE 100 index was down 27 points, or 0.7%, at 4,131.40, its lowest level for two months, after closing 0.5% higher on Thursday.
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