LONDON (ShareCast) - Platinum miner Lonmin surged ahead after Xstrata made a £5bn offer to buy the group. Xstrata proposed a £33 per share cash offer, which is a 42% premium on Lonmin's share price yesterday. Lonmin branded the offer “opportunistic” and “unwelcome”.

Xstrata also said today that re-tax profits for the half-year fell slightly to $4bn from $4.47bn previously. Revenue rose to $16bn from $14.2bn

Kazakh miner Eurasian Natural Resources rises after it said second quarter production volumes across the group were higher than a year ago, while ore grades remained broadly consistent.

Broadcaster ITV is one of the losers after it slumped into losses of £1,537m versus profits of £105m for the half year and slashed dividends by 50% to 0.675p. The group said ITV Family net advertising revenue (NAR) was up 1% and viewing share rose 2.5%. ITV estimates that ITV NAR for September will be down 20% with the total market down 17%.

London Stock Exchange is higher after it saw a total of 24.3m equity trades carried out in the month, an increase of 35%, driven by strong trading in UK equities.

Insurer Old Mutual gives up some of yesterday’s gains despite posting strong results. The company lifted interim operating profit by 3% despite the depreciation of the South African rand, market turbulence and problems at its US business. Funds under management dropped 7% from 31 December 2007 to £259.4bn, although they were steady in the second quarter.

Insurer Standard Life was also down despite saying first half operating pre-tax profit rose 51%.

Shopping centre owner Liberty International slipped into losses due to bad debts and lease incentive write-offs. Liberty also said property values are unlikely to recover until stability returns to the banking sector. "Therefore we consider the process of falling property values is not yet complete," it said.

FTSE 100 - Risers
Lonmin (LMI) 3,420.00p +47.48%
London Stock Exchange Group (LSE) 937.00p +6.36%
Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,852.00p +4.40%
Johnson Matthey (JMAT) 1,571.00p +4.11%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 540.00p +3.85%
Cairn Energy (CNE) 2,656.00p +3.63%
Eurasian Natural Resources (ENRC) 984.00p +3.58%
Ferrexpo (FXPO) 265.00p +3.11%
Anglo American (AAL) 2,772.00p +2.90%
John Wood Group (WG.) 401.50p +2.62%

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