Sector movers: Investors hit pause on Warhammer maker's rampage

Defensive issues and some of the last few years' best performers were at the bottom of the pile at the end of the week as stocks on the other side of the Pond debated the staying power of recent gains on Wall Street.

Pacing losses were Leisure Goods, a sector whose sole component was Games Workshop, the owner of the Warhammer videogame franchise, whose shares had rocketed by nearly 1,000% since the Brexit referendum, making it the second-biggest riser on the FTSE All-Share index since then.

More down to earth investors were also smarting (a little) as Ferrexpo, the second best performer on the FTSE All-Share index over that same time frame, weighed on the Industrial Metals space.

Indeed, as an asset class commodities had paced gains globally throughout most of 2019, although more recently they had been superseded by equities, and as of the previous day were sporting a rise of roughly 9.8% against 15.5% for stocks worldwide.

AstraZeneca meanwhile had put in strong gains in recent weeks, as so many other large cap defensive names, after the US-China trade talks brokedown and investors put a premium on shares of so-called bond proxies.

Speaking of the US and China, on Friday investors were already looking out to the G-20 leaders summit scheduled for at the end of the following week in Osaka, Japan, where the Presidents of the US and China were expected to meet.

Most investors did not appear overly constructive on what the most likely result of the encounter betwen Donald Trump and Xi Jinping would be, but there were some notable exceptions.

On that note, the day before, strategists at Bank of America-Merrill Lynch had told clients: "Trump prefers to be "Jobs President" not "Tariff President"; steel first industry to receive tariff protection; US Steel factory closure, slump in Philly Fed, rising joblesss claimsin battleground state Pennsylvania suggests G20 trade war escalation unlikely."

And on the recent risk rally, BofA-ML appeared to take a contrarian stance, saying: "The "fat pitch": Fed dovish + no G20 trade war escalation means stay long risk; "fat pitch" in H2 = short US dollar[...] everyone believes that 2% on the US Treasury is a rational price, and 3000 on the S&P500 is an irrational price."

Top performing sectors so far today

Technology Hardware & Equipment 1,197.28 +2.99%

Oil Equipment, Services & Distribution 9,328.59 +1.28%

Automobiles & Parts 6,444.18 +0.92%

Oil & Gas Producers 9,451.05 +0.92%

Food & Drug Retailers 3,895.33 +0.80%

Bottom performing sectors so far today

Leisure Goods 11,917.16 -3.20%

Pharmaceuticals & Biotechnology 15,301.72 -2.24%

Industrial Metals & Mining 5,984.30 -2.17%

Aerospace and Defence 4,638.12 -1.58%

Fixed Line Telecommunications 2,354.62 -1.48%