Headline shares continued on a downward slope as lunch approached, with miners and oil stocks amongst the biggest losers. At time of writing, the FTSE 100 was down 71.3 points trading at 5227.7.
LONDON MARKETS
Resource stocks pulled the FTSE further down this lunchtime, with Cairn Energy Plc (LON:CNE) down 3.69% at 428.5p, Fresnillo (LON:FRES), down 3.68% at 1046p, BG Group (LON:BG.), down 3.64% at 1084p and BP (LON:BP.). down 2.85% at 339.55p. Other losers included Barclays (LON:BARC), Aviva (LON:AV.), Wolseley (LON:WOS) and Legal and General. Of the few shares actually gaining in morning trade, Whitbread (LON:WTB) was up on the back of good figures by 3% at 1523p, Intertek Group (LON:ITRK), up 1.2% at 1481p and BATS, up a measly 0.14% at 2173p.
Stanelco (LON:SEO) says sales growth in both its Bioplastic and RF Technologies divisions is ahead of market expectations. In his AGM statement, the bioplastics and radio frequency group's chairman John Standen said progress continued in developing significant business opportunities through Biome Bioplastics. Biome's composting trials with a major American supplier to the food processing market had been completed successfully and it was now moving into commercial scale-up.
Budget airline, Ryanair has opened a new base at Malaga with 4 based aircraft and 44 routes. The Airline will now operate 360 weekly flights to/from Malaga with an investment of over $250 million in the airport.
Philippines-focused Toledo Mining expects to complete its current exploration drilling programme before the end of 2010, with an updated resource estimate following shortly afterwards. The company's Berong nickel deposit on Palawan Island currently hosts a JORC resource of 10Mt @1.55% Ni (155,000t contained nickel), sufficient to supply a direct ore shipping operation for 15 years. Toledo is undertaking a 20,000m drilling programme with the aim of expanding the JORC resource to 40Mt, sufficient to support a 20,000tpa nickel processing operation.
China-based software and IT solutions developer Sinosoft has signed a partnership agreement with NorthgateArinso UK, a human resources software and services provider.
Software company Zoo Digital Group Plc (LON:ZOO) says a second major film studio has adopted a solution using its media collaboration platform. The client, one of Hollywood's largest studios, cannot be named for contractual reasons, says Zoo. CEO Stuart Green said, 'We're…
