LONDON (ShareCast) - Footsie is trading in the same range, still being supported by strong miners as Wall Street starts with decent gains

Commodity plays have rallied with the US market and hopes that the planned $150bn injection into the economy will spark a revival. Vedanta, Kazakhmys and Rio Tinto are best of the bunch.

Xstrata has cut production across its chrome ferrochrome furnaces and vanadium and platinum operations in South Africa following a request from Eskom to reduce demand.

Other resources stocks posting good gains include Cairn Energy, BP and Shell as crude prices go back above $90 a barrel gave the oil majors a lift.

Shell shrugged off a JP Morgan downgrade to ‘underweight’ from ‘neutral’ with price target cut to 2,050p from 2,350p. The broker cited short term issues such as decreased oil production.

Imperial Tobacco is higher after it said the acquisition of Altadis, which went unconditional earlier in the week, will be financed through a rights issues, raising no more than £5bn. It also said it would launch a tender offer for the remaining shares of Logista, which Altadis does not own, at €52.50 per but said it would back down if a rival bidder offered more.

Housebuilders Persimmon, Taylor Wimpey and Barratt Developments have resumed their downward trend though, largely attributed to profit taking.

Scottish & Newcastle and the Carlsberg/Heineken consortium have agreed terms for a recommend cash offer for the Kronenberg, John Smith's and Strongbow owner worth 800p a share. The offer values Edinburgh-based S&N at around £7.8bn.

St James’s Place’s buoyancy following yesterday’s strong trading statement was tempered slightly after Goldman Sachs downgraded the wealth manager to ‘neutral’ from ‘buy’, cutting its price target to 361p from 371p.

Lehman Brothers has initiated coverage on Thomas Cook with an ‘overweight’ rating and a 300p price target,

Brewer and pub owner Marston's like-for-like sales in the managed division slowed in the last 8 weeks to 19 January and were 0.1% up on a year ago while brewing volumes were below last year, it said this morning.

Restaurant group Prezzo has also seen trading slow and profits in 2007 will be at the lower end of forecasts. Since September, there has been some evidence of a softening in consumer spending, noticeably so in the month of November, it said.

Russia-focused oil producer Imperial Energy reported a 229% increase in its Russian oil and gas reserves to 372m barrels of oil equivalent.

Video streaming specialist Vividas has warned expectations this year will need "a material downward adjustment" after slower trading and reorganisation costs.

Shares in Litho Supplies fell sharply after the printing and graphic art materials supplier warned that pre-tax profit for the year will be below expectations. Trading in the second half of the year was impacted by reduced confidence following the uncertainties in the financial markets, the group said.

Scanning software specialist Dicom will make about 50 redundancies, close certain facilities and record an exceptional charge of £3.5m to £3.8m in the second half of 2008 after a review of the business.

Mining and exploration firm Cambridge Minerals has completed financing arrangements for the development of up to three of its gold mine projects in Colombia.

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