Sector movers: Miners, oil companies and drugmakers lead rally
Miners and drugmakers led London stock indices higher on Wednesday, while tobacco and industrials got left behind.
Metals and miners were up amid a softer dollar ahead of the Federal Reserve rates decision later.
"Safe haven demand for gold and the Japanese yen are underpinned by the risk off sentiment, though USD (a haven of its own) is weaker amid Fed outlook uncertainty," said Mike van Dulken at Accendo Markets.
"Dollar weakness is supporting GBP, likely pressuring FTSE international names. On the other hand it is helping metals prices (copper +1%) and thus FTSE miners."
All the larger UK-listed oil and gas producers were in the green, apart from Energean, as oil prices rallied after their sizeable fall the previous day. Brent crude was up 3% to $58.02 a barrel.
The pharmaceuticals sector was given a shot in the arm by GlaxoSmithKline, which received a warm welcome after saying it had struck a deal to combine its consumer health business with Pfizer to into a joint venture generating £10bn of annual sales, before spinning it off as a separately listed company within three years.
GSK, which will have controlling stake of 68%, said the combination of the two businesses is expected to generate annual cost savings of £0.5bn by 2022 at a cash cost of £0.9bn and non-cash costs of £0.3bn.
Tobacco was mixed, with British American Tobacco down slightly and Imperial Brands inching higher.
Top performing sectors so far today
Technology Hardware & Equipment 940.15 +3.29%
Leisure Goods 7,307.93 +2.63%
Industrial Metals & Mining 4,430.04 +2.55%
Forestry & Paper 18,186.49 +1.99%
Pharmaceuticals & Biotechnology 14,570.27 +1.93%
Bottom performing sectors so far today
Tobacco 30,275.34 -0.49%
General Industrials 5,029.42 -0.41%
Personal Goods 35,666.48 -0.40%
Industrial Engineering 10,271.02 -0.36%
Oil Equipment, Services & Distribution 10,519.65 -0.27%
Market Movers
FTSE 100 (UKX) 6,753.06 0.77%
FTSE 250 (MCX) 17,602.52 0.61%
techMARK (TASX) 3,339.15 1.16%
FTSE 100 - Risers
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) 1,538.60p 6.24%
Melrose Industries (MRO) 162.05p 3.98%
Evraz (EVR) 475.50p 2.92%
Just Eat (JE.) 592.80p 2.56%
Berkeley Group Holdings (The) (BKG) 3,424.00p 2.45%
GVC Holdings (GVC) 711.61p 2.32%
Croda International (CRDA) 4,698.00p 1.98%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 3,801.00p 1.85%
WPP (WPP) 886.00p 1.77%
Halma (HLMA) 1,324.00p 1.77%
FTSE 100 - Fallers
Smurfit Kappa Group (SKG) 1,976.00p -2.76%
Randgold Resources Ltd. (RRS) 6,740.00p -2.12%
Royal Mail (RMG) 281.70p -1.78%
Smiths Group (SMIN) 1,393.00p -1.07%
Direct Line Insurance Group (DLG) 302.60p -1.01%
BAE Systems (BA.) 453.30p -1.00%
Aviva (AV.) 367.00p -1.00%
Associated British Foods (ABF) 2,105.00p -0.94%
Smith (DS) (SMDS) 298.80p -0.93%
Kingfisher (KGF) 218.40p -0.91%
FTSE 250 - Risers
888 Holdings (888) 184.20p 8.35%
FDM Group (Holdings) (FDM) 794.00p 5.17%
Just Group (JUST) 95.00p 5.09%
Rank Group (RNK) 148.23p 4.83%
Elementis (ELM) 177.80p 4.47%
Mediclinic International (MDC) 333.00p 3.93%
Softcat (SCT) 587.00p 3.89%
Galliford Try (GFRD) 587.00p 3.80%
Computacenter (CCC) 999.00p 3.63%
CLS Holdings (CLI) 219.00p 3.55%
FTSE 250 - Fallers
Kier Group (KIE) 389.40p -6.03%
AA (AA.) 77.34p -5.15%
Weir Group (WEIR) 1,286.50p -3.56%
G4S (GFS) 188.60p -2.93%
Avast (AVST) 258.90p -2.80%
Premier Oil (PMO) 60.15p -1.96%
Spirax-Sarco Engineering (SPX) 5,985.00p -1.72%
Hunting (HTG) 483.00p -1.71%
Hikma Pharmaceuticals (HIK) 1,859.50p -1.69%
Inchcape (INCH) 542.00p -1.63%