LONDON (ShareCast) - London’s top shares finished with stellar gains as a strong start on Wall Street added to the earlier drive from finance and real estate stocks.

Liberty International was the strongest Footsie riser with fellow property stocks British Land also amongst the top ten risers.

Banks also surged ahead, aided by Lloyds TSB, Barclays, RBS and HBOS. Insurer Prudential and Aviva were also up while other financials such as Man Group and Schroders bounced as well.

There were only a handful of fallers today, all from the resource sectors. Miners were the biggest drags with Eurasian Natural Resources, Xstrata and Vedanta Resources in the red.

WPP reported a strong first half which beat most estimates, although the advertising giant said prospects for 2009 remain less certain due to the financial crisis and commodity price increases.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has singled out iron ore as a likely sticking point in the path to regulatory clearance of BHP Billiton’s bid for Rio Tinto.

Pest control group Rentokil posted a 55% fall in first half underlying profit to £39.3m. Revenues rose 11% to £1.18bn. Pre-tax profits fell 72% to £18.3m. "We have made a solid start with strong improvement in customer service over the past four months, but we are on a three to five-year journey to profit recovery," chief executive Alan Brown said.

Insurance giant Aon has made an agreed £844m bid for insurance broker Benfield. The agreed price of 350p per share values Benfield's existing issued share capital at approximately £738m and the entire issued and to be issued share capital of Benfield at approximately £844m.

Bus and rail firm Arriva's interim profits surged, despite the sharp increase in fuel costs. Pre-tax profit in the first half of 2008 rose to £66.3m from £47.3m a year earlier on revenue that grew from £909.2m to £1,443.4m.

Precision instrumentation firm Spectris reported a 16% rise in first half pre-tax profit and said orders to date continue to be encouraging. Adjusted pre-tax profit rose to £42.6m in the six month ended 30 June compared with £36.8m last year on sales up 8% to £358.5m.

Bradford & Bingley's underwriters have been stuck with the rump of 597m shares, 72.16% of its recent rights issue.

IT training group Xpertise has received a bid of 150p per share from QA-IQ Investments, a premium of 95% to the share price yesterday.

Construction firm Kingspan has completed the acquisition of US panel maker Metecno for around $111m.

Oil and gas exploration and production company Dragon Oil is confident of delivering on its promises for 2008 after posting sharply higher profits at the half-year stage.

FTSE 100 - Risers
Liberty International (LII) 945.00p +8.00%
Lloyds TSB Group (LLOY) 299.50p +6.96%
Aviva (AV.) 509.50p +6.81%
HBOS (HBOS) 289.00p +6.25%
British Land Co (BLND) 751.50p +6.22%
Standard Life (SL.) 246.25p +6.03%
Prudential (PRU) 537.00p +6.02%
Ferrexpo (FXPO) 268.00p +5.82%
Whitbread (WTB) 1,150.00p +5.60%
Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 220.75p +5.37%

FTSE 100 - Fallers
Eurasian Natural Resources (ENRC) 1,033.00p -2.73%
Xstrata (XTA) 3,101.00p -1.87%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 575.00p -0.61%
Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,798.00p -0.55%
Tullow Oil (TLW) 796.50p -0.38%
Cairn Energy (CNE) 2,866.00p -0.35%
Petrofac Ltd (PFC) 587.00p -0.34%
International Power (IPR) 389.00p +0.13%
Anglo American (AAL) 2,875.00p +0.17%
BP (BP.) 519.25p +0.44%

FTSE 250 - Risers
Benfield Group (BFD) 345.50p +27.49%
Aricom (ORE) 46.75p +10.65%
Persimmon (PSN) 360.00p +10.09%
Yell Group (YELL) 99.75p +9.92%
Kier Group (KIE) 1,095.00p +8.42%
Heritage Oil (HOIL) 205.00p +7.89%
Mecom Group (MEC) 21.00p +7.69%
Taylor Wimpey (TW.) 45.50p +7.69%
Brit Insurance Holding (BRE) 191.25p +7.59%
International Ferro Metals (IFL) 85.00p +7.59%

FTSE 250 - Fallers
Rentokil Initial (RTO) 69.25p -6.10%
Michael Page International (MPI) 357.00p -4.42%
Dana Petroleum (DNX) 1,420.00p -2.54%
Micro Focus International Plc (MCRO) 293.50p -2.33%
Electrocomponents (ECM) 172.00p -1.43%
BH Macro (BHME) € 14.20 -1.39%
Wellstream Holdings (WSM) 1,137.00p -0.96%
RPS Group (RPS) 289.00p -0.86%
Premier Oil (PMO) 1,344.00p -0.81%
Hays (HAS) 91.50p -0.81%

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