LONDON (ShareCast) - Airlines pushed their way to the front of the FTSE 100 leaderboard as the price of crude fell again after Hurricane Gustav caused less disruption to oil facilities than had been forecast.

British Airways led the way as the price of crude dipped below $108 per barrel. Other travel-related groups also soared with tour operators TUI and Thomas Cook the best performing Footsie stocks at lunchtime.

Retailers were also going well even though JP Morgan's note on the European fashion retail sector was less than complimentary about UK firms.

“We remain cautious on the UK apparel sector as the supply/demand balance is still unfavourable and a stronger dollar and cost pressures from Asia are likely to pressure margins in 2009,” it said.

Consensus earnings per share forecasts are 10-15% too high for the UK apparel retailers for 2009, but are more reasonable in mainland Europe. Next leapt ahead even though JPM's rating remains ‘neutral’ with a 1,050p target.

Oil-related stocks are the worst performers. Tullow, Cairn and oil services group John Wood lead the fallers.

FTSE 100 - Risers
Thomas Cook Group (TCG) 248.00p +7.94%
Next (NXT) 1,151.00p +7.27%
Wolseley (WOS) 489.25p +6.24%
London Stock Exchange Group (LSE) 819.50p +6.08%
British Airways (BAY) 277.50p +6.02%
Enterprise Inns (ETI) 312.00p +5.41%
TUI Travel (TT.) 227.75p +5.32%
Sainsbury (J) (SBRY) 367.00p +5.23%

FTSE 100 - Fallers
Tullow Oil (TLW) 750.50p -5.12%
Anglo American (AAL) 2,642.00p -4.96%
John Wood Group (WG.) 434.50p -4.56%
BHP Billiton (BLT) 1,573.00p -4.55%
BG Group (BG.) 1,116.00p -4.21%
Cairn Energy (CNE) 2,694.00p -4.13%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 4,810.00p -3.99%
Xstrata (XTA) 2,811.00p -3.80%

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