Profit-taking sends London markets lower

The London equities markets were down on Tuesday, with the FTSE 100 losing 0.6 percent to 5,935.7 and the FTSE 250 down 0.4 percent to 9,816.1 on a volume of 3.8 billion shares traded. The declines did not seem to bother traders very much, however, as they put off much of the losses to simple profit-taking.

In the telecommunications sector, Vodafone lost 4 percent to 119½p after the European Commission said it would cut international roaming charges.

Rising crude oil prices sent BP’s shares up by 0.6 percent to 663p, while Royal Dutch Shell gained 0.5 percent to £18.44. Meanwhile, Dana Petroleum added 7.5 percent to £10.85 after it said it was on its way to increasing its production capacity to the equivalent of 40,000 barrels of oil per day by the end of next year.

Brewer Scottish and Newcastle gained 0.2 percent to 545p on rumors that it was being targeted for a takeover.

In the mining sector, Kazakhmys added 1 percent to 962p in anticipation of its full-year earnings report, due Thurdsay, and on a reiteration of Credit Suisse’s “outperform” rating. Elsewhere in the sector, Anglo American was down 0.2 perent to £21.42 on the news that its chief executive had sold 33,879 shares in the company.

Standard Chartered was down 2.8 percent to £14.82 on news that Temasek, Singapore’s state-owned investment company had purchased the 11.6 percent stake in the company from the Khoo family, which had held the shares for years. Also in the banking sector, Royal Bank of Scotland lost 0.2 percent to £18.40, partly because the Khoo family’s Standard Chartered shares were off the table as a purchase target.

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