LONDON (ShareCast) - Very few blue chips failed to participate in London’s surge back through 5,500 Wednesday, with the number of losers in single figures ahead of lunch.

Banks were very much in favour, following in the footsteps of their US counterparts who rallied last night after Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke said troubled banks could be given more time to tap into the Fed’s emergency funds.

Lloyds TSB, Barclays and Royal Bank of Scotland stood out, joined by insurers Legal & General, Aviva and Old Mutual.

Alliance & Leicester has reacted well to the appointment of former Ulster bank man Alan Gillespie as its new chairman, while Bradford & Bingley is also up on reports that its main shareholders are firmly committed to its rescue.

Top of the pile was London Stock Exchange as it revealed that first quarter revenue rose 8% to £178m, or by 3% in constant currency.

A $5 a barrel fall in the price of oil overnight had given a boost to British Airways, Ryanair and easyjet, but a rise to $138 had the airlines back in the red.

Housebuilders are axing more jobs, with Redrow and Bovis both set to shed 40% of their staff. Bovis is to cut its interim dividend by 75% to 5p to counter what it says is the worst market backdrop it has seen for many years.

But a spate of bargain hunting has sent the beleaguered sector sharply higher. Barratt Developments, Taylor Wimpey and Persimmon have gained much welcome support.

WPP has launched a bid of 260.6p per share for market research group Taylor Nelson. The bid consists of 173p in cash and 0.1889 of a new WPP share. The offer, which counters a nil-premium merger agreed with Germany’s Gfk, values TNS at around £1.082bn.

Tullow Oil estimates its Jubilee field in Ghana could hold as much as 1.8bn barrels and will start production in 2010. "The recoverable resources of the field are now estimated to range from 500m barrels up to 1.8bn barrels," it said. Tullow added that group working interest production for the first half of 2008 averaged 70,550 boepd, 1% higher than the 2007 average. Sales volumes for the first half of 2008 averaged 60,000 boepd.

Multi-utility group Telecom Plus reports "exceptionally good trading" in the first quarter to June with turnover, profits, customer numbers, new services and new distributor recruitment all running substantially ahead of last year.

Insolvency specialist Begbies Traynor posted lower full year profits but expects a recovery this year as the impact of the credit crunch sends more firms to the wall.

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