Wood Group awarded Texas contract, Stagecoach maintains interim dividend

London open

The FTSE 100 is expected to open 59 points lower on Wednesday, having closed down 0.56% at 7,022.76 on Tuesday.

Stocks to watch

Wood Group said it had been awarded a $43m contract by an unnamed large-cap midstream company to construct 80 miles of steel pipeline in west Texas. The project will serve to transport natural gas liquids across Texas. At peak construction, the project is anticipated to employ 200 people, Wood said.

Stagecoach Group issued its interim results for the half-year ended 27 October on Wednesday, reporting adjusted earnings per share of 12.9p, down from 13.6p but still ahead of expectations, as the prior year included a strong contribution from the now-defunct South West Trains franchise. The FTSE 250 passenger transport operator swung to a statutory loss per share of 5.5p, from earnings of 13.6p, with the board maintaining the interim dividend at 3.8p per share.

Riverstone Energy on Wednesday said it had sold 100% of its membership interests in Mexico-focused Sierra Oil & Gas to DEA Deutsche Erdoel for an undisclosed sum.

Civitas Social Housing has assured that the recent declaration that one of its main tenants has been declared non-compliant by the social housing regulator is "unlikely" to be detrimental to the company's net asset value. In a summary regulatory judgement, the Regulator of Social Housing gave Westmoreland Supported Housing, which represents 22.6% of the NAV of the Civitas portfolio, non-compliant ratings for governance and financial viability.

Newspaper round-up

China has said that Beijing and Washington will push forward with trade negotiations in the next 90 days and it is confident that an agreement can be reached but doubts remain over whether the two sides can resolve their deep differences. The commerce ministry, in a brief statement on its website, also said China would work to implement specific issues already agreed upon as quickly as possible. - Guardian

A powerful investor body has raised concerns with the heads of 32 leading listed companies for failing to address significant shareholder rebellions. The Investment Association has written to groups, including AstraZeneca, WPP and Berkeley Group, that have faced revolts on the same resolution for two years in a row. In more than half of the letters to the “repeat offenders”, the shareholder dissent at annual meetings related to concerns about excessive executive pay. - The Times

Britain's oldest coal-fired power plants prepared to fire up their hoppers for a price of almost £1,000 per megawatt-hour on Tuesday to avert a power shortfall as temperatures across the country plunge and wind power wanes. The cold snap ignited the winter’s first warning that Britain would run out of electricity unless idling coal plants ramp up to help meet demand for power. - Telegraph

US close

Wall Street closed with heavy losses on Tuesday, after a session in which traders looked into the fine print of Monday's trade war ceasefire with China and digested a flattening yield curve in government debt.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the day down 3.1% at 25,027.27, the S&P 500 was off 3.24% at 2,700.06, and the Nasdaq 100 was 3.78% softer at 6,795.21.

Following Monday's rally, market participants grew increasingly sceptical about the truce between China and the US with confusion about when it would kick-off also undermining sentiment.

Trump's economic advisor, Larry Kudlow told reporters on Monday that it would start on 1 January, but the White House later issued a statement saying that the 90-day truce began on 1 December.

There was also confusion over the details of the truce, with several senior White House figures contradicting one another.

“The weekend dinner date between Trump and Xi initially drew a positive response, with markets rallying at the prospect of the trade war being paused for a few months and possibly even stopped altogether as talks progress well,” said Oanda analyst Craig Erlam.