Leading shares are continuing their slide after overnight dips in the US and Asia, with not a single riser currently in the FTSE 100.
A weaker oil price - Brent crude is down 1% at $51.38 - has hit commodity stocks, with BP down 3.6p at 370.55p as it unveiled a deal to merge its Norwegian assets with those of Det norske.
Financial shares are also lower as investors seek havens for their cash, pushing bond yields close to negative territory. Barclays is 3.8p lower at 172.25p and Standard Chartered down 11.3p at 524.1p.
Standard Life has dropped 6.9p to 323.7p as UBS cut its target price from 380p to 347p.
Overall the FTSE 100 has fallen 73.41 points to 6158.48 after hitting a near six week high earlier on Tuesday. Downbeat comments from European Central Bank president Mario Draghi on Thursday, and billionaire investor George Soros warning of the risks of Brexit were among the factors weighing on investors’ minds. A number of recent polls have shown the Leave campaign gaining ground or indeed leading the way. AJ Bell investment director Russ Mould said:
The FTSE 100 was firmly down in early trading after US and Asian markets retreated overnight on weakening oil and wider commodity prices and with Brexit uncertainty growing ahead of the EU referendum.
Tesco has fallen 2.95p to 154.95p despite selling its Turkish business and Giraffe cafe chain. Sainsbury, which said its finance director John Rogers would become the chief executive of Argos-owner Home Retail when its takeover of the business is complete, is down 2.8p at 244.7p.
Among the mid-caps recruitment group Hays has fallen 8.6p to 126.4p after Deutsche Bank issued a sell note with a 105p target price in a note on the staffing sector. PageGroup is 26.5p lower at 372.5p as Deutsche slashed its target price from 530p to 290p. Rival SThree is down 27p at 324p as it warned of more difficult market conditions in banking and finance in the UK and US. On staffing agencies Deutsche said:
Staffing and recruitment companies have already de-rated and as such it is tempting to try and look through the downgrades, however, we believe it is too early to say that a downturn is “in the price” until the earnings downgrades have started to come through.
We believe that slower US growth will be a precursor to weaker growth in other geographies. The US (JOLTS survey), UK, Japan and Germany all have job vacancies above their previous peak such that a de-rating of earnings growth seems sensible.
