LONDON (ShareCast) - London's blue chips are still in the red having started badly on the back of a poor performance on Wall Street overnight.

HBOS, which has a £4bn rights issue at 275p closing in July, leads the way, presumably as short-sellers close positions, but companies that may possibly need to tap shareholders in future, such as Alliance & Leicester and Persimmon, are also up.

Johnston Press, another rights issuer, is also a big riser. The Scotsman and Yorkshire Post publisher is lifted by speculation that it will receive an offer from Malaysian investment group Usaha Tegas Sdn.

BG is up after it revealed another new oil discovery in the Santos Basin, offshore Brazil. The exploration well, known as Guara, discovered oil within the BM-S-9 concession area, the second discovery within the BM-S-9 concession area where BG holds a 30% interest along with operator Petrobras (45%).

Carphone Warehouse moves higher after Citigroup upgraded its rating on the mobile phone supplier to ‘hold’ from ‘sell’ to reflect the 40% slide in its share price this year.

Enironmental consultant AEA is to buy Project Performance Corporation, an environmental management and information technology consulting firm headquartered in Virginia, United States, for a consideration £33m. A 4 for 5 rights at 40p will raise £39.7m to pay for the deal.

Guoco has upped its stake in Mecca Bingo ownerRank to 13.1% from 12.7%. The move by Guoco, run by Quek Leng Chan, is likely to add further fuel to speculation that the Asian firm is considering a bid for the UK group. The company, part of Malaysia’s Hong Leong Group, has been building up its holding in the UK firm since the beginning of 2008.

Menswear chain Moss Bros is to pay a special dividend of 1.3p on the 28 July 2008 even though like-for-like sales for the first 19 weeks of the year to 7 June were down by 1.5 %. "The men's retail market continues to be extremely challenging but management believes the business is well set up to navigate this difficult period," chief executive Philip Mountford said.

Altium Securities lowered its rating on Moss Bros to ‘sell’ from ‘neutral’ after the lacklustre trading update today. The tougher trading conditions experienced prompted Altium to reduce its forecasts on the chain.

Recruitment firm Hydrogen Group has suffered collateral damage from the crisis in the investment banking sector, with levels of recruitment activity flat in a traditionally busy time for the sector.

Bid target Meldex has responded to a recent slide in its share price by assuring investors it is not preparing to launch a rights issue. The pharmaceutical and healthcare company says it knows of no business reason for the recent sharp fall in its share price.

Arbuthnot Securities has upped its rating on Randgold Resources to ‘buy’ from ‘neutral’ in light of the dip in the Africa-focused gold miner’s share price recently. The broker pointed to a 30% drop in Randgold’s stock since April, which came on the back of a fall in the gold price of only 8.7%.

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