FTSE 100 movers: Smurfit Kappa gains on price hike; supermarkets drop
London’s FTSE 100 was down 0.1% to 7,198.26 in afternoon trade as investors awaited the inauguration of Donald Trump across the pond.
Smurfit Kappa was the standout gainer after the paper and cardboard packaging company said it will hike the price of recycled containerboard by €60 a tonne.
BT Group was a top riser as it said it will bump up prices for its broadband and landline services and will start charging TV customers £3.50 for BT Sport.
Premier Inn and Costa owner Whitbread was given a boost after Barclays lifted its rating on the stock to ‘equalweight’ from ‘underweight’ and raised the target price to 4,150p from 3,340p.
Barclays said it expects the owner of Costa coffee shops and Premier Inn hotels to report a “good” third quarter and an “excellent” fourth quarter trading statement on 26 January on the back of strong data in London and the UK.
On the downside, supermarkets Tesco and Sainsbury lost ground as Exane BNP Paribas downgraded the stocks.
The bank cut Tesco to ‘underperform’ from ‘neutral’ and pushed the target price down to 175p from 200p pointing to a high risk of de-rating given a building risk that inflation isn’t fully passed through to the shopper, a tougher industry volume outlook and nothing in its recent consumer survey to prove volume growth is a given.
It cut Sainsbury to ‘neutral’ from ‘outperform’, keeping the price target at 255p.
“With our target price now a little below the current share price and a building risk cost inflation isn’t passed through to the shopper smoothly, we cut our rating,” it said.
Royal Mail was under the cosh as Credit Suisse cut its price target on the stock to 481p from 559p and Jefferies downgraded its price target to 360p from 390p following the company’s disappointing update on Thursday.
Risers
Smurfit Kappa Group (SKG) 2,141.00p 2.49%
Capita (CPI) 511.00p 1.89%
BT Group (BT.A) 385.20p 1.89%
Whitbread (WTB) 4,132.00p 1.50%
CRH (CRH) 2,832.00p 1.43%
London Stock Exchange Group (LSE) 3,051.00p 1.36%
Mondi (MNDI) 1,783.00p 1.08%
Royal Dutch Shell 'A' (RDSA) 2,228.50p 0.91%
Schroders (SDR) 3,008.00p 0.87%
Imperial Brands (IMB) 3,588.00p 0.86%
Fallers
Sainsbury (J) (SBRY) 262.00p -2.24%
AstraZeneca (AZN) 4,373.00p -2.14%
Royal Mail (RMG) 414.00p -2.01%
Tesco (TSCO) 198.90p -1.83%
Barratt Developments (BDEV) 496.50p -1.78%
Anglo American (AAL) 1,279.50p -1.73%
Taylor Wimpey (TW.) 166.60p -1.71%
Persimmon (PSN) 1,925.00p -1.53%
Associated British Foods (ABF) 2,546.00p -1.51%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 3,407.00p -1.49%