British Energy is one of the top risers in morning trading after a press report that the nuclear power company has received three bid approaches.
The potential bidders are French utility EDF, France's Suez, and a combined proposal from Germany's RWE and Spain's Iberdrola, according to Reuters.
BE shares are up 44.4p, or around 6%, at 724p.
BE, which also generates electricity, has confirmed that it has received a range of proposals from several parties but declined to elaborate.
Early speculation that British Energy will command a price of up to £12bn appear increasingly optimistic with bids expected to be closer to half that.
Foreign utilities are primarily interested in using BE's sites for building a new generation of atomic plants, although the complicated structure of BE's business may hamper some bids.
British Airways is another of the big risers after the airline announced record annual profits despite the recent fiasco of the Terminal 5 opening. In an attempt to draw a line under T5 BA's chief executive Willie Walsh has turned down a bonus of up to £700,000.
Analysts said the results were better than expected and the oultook for the year ahead - revenue growth of 4% despite higher fuel costs - was not as bad as feared.
"This is positive because we had feared that the revenue guidance would be
reduced considerably," said Citi analysts in a note.
J Sainsbury is among the biggest fallers, down 2.5p at 375.5p, after a downbeat note from Goldman Sachs. "We continue to believe that (the) operating environment will remain challenging in the UK as consumers are stretched and the slowdown in the sector will likely lead to margin pressure as competitors try to absorb food price inflation rather than pass it on to consumers."
Overall, however the FTSE 100 has made a confident start. It is up about 86 points at 6338.3.
