London open: Stocks fall as Shell, BP gush lower

(Sharecast News) - London stocks fell in early trade on Tuesday, with energy issues in the red as oil prices declined. At 0915 BST, the FTSE 100 was down 0.4% at 8,322.10.

Richard Hunter, head of markets at Interactive Investor, said: "The absence of any obvious catalysts also led to a tepid opening in the UK, with the main indices struggling for direction after a buoyant few trading sessions. There was some fairly lacklustre early buying interest in the mining stocks, although a drifting oil price overnight weighed slightly on the oil majors BP and Shell.

"Although largely overtaken by subsequent events, the release of the Federal Reserve minutes tomorrow will nonetheless garner investor attention. Of more topical significance, however, will be Chair Powell's comments at the Jackson Hole Symposium on Friday, where clues will be sought on the very latest Fed thinking.

"The current consensus is that an interest rate cut in September is now all but nailed on, with some debate over the size of the reduction. A move of 0.25% has regained its position as being most likely, with thoughts of a cut of 0.5% now subsiding given the most recent data, although the release of non-farm payroll numbers in early September will be pivotal, as proved to be the case earlier this month."

In equity markets, BT Group slumped on news that Sky has struck strike a deal to launch its broadband services on CityFibre's network from next year. BT currently hosts all of Sky's roughly 5.7m broadband customers on its Openreach network.

BP and Shell gushed lower as oil prices neared their lowest levels this year amid hopes of a ceasefire in Gaza.

Wood Group lost ground as it said it swung to an operating loss in the first half as revenue fell, but the engineering firm backed its outlook for this year and the next.

In the six months to the end of June, the company swung to a statutory operating loss of $899m from a profit of $23m in the same period a year earlier, with revenue down 4.8% to $2.8bn.

Market Movers

FTSE 100 (UKX) 8,322.10 -0.42% FTSE 250 (MCX) 21,191.08 0.16% techMARK (TASX) 4,908.03 -0.11%

FTSE 100 - Risers

Taylor Wimpey (TW.) 165.20p 2.26% Glencore (GLEN) 412.95p 2.25% Rightmove (RMV) 543.20p 2.11% Scottish Mortgage Inv Trust (SMT) 870.40p 1.75% Sage Group (SGE) 1,033.00p 1.72% Barratt Developments (BDEV) 561.40p 1.34% easyJet (EZJ) 441.50p 1.22% InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) 7,576.00p 1.18% Vistry Group (VTY) 1,380.00p 1.17% International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (CDI) (IAG) 174.15p 1.16%

FTSE 100 - Fallers

BT Group (BT.A) 138.80p -4.67% BP (BP.) 434.45p -1.72% Shell (SHEL) 2,766.00p -1.67% SEGRO (SGRO) 882.60p -1.50% Spirax Group (SPX) 7,460.00p -1.45% Vodafone Group (VOD) 74.54p -1.27% Hikma Pharmaceuticals (HIK) 2,046.00p -1.16% Burberry Group (BRBY) 696.40p -0.88% British American Tobacco (BATS) 2,758.00p -0.83% Centrica (CNA) 128.75p -0.81%

FTSE 250 - Risers

Redrow (RDW) 808.00p 6.25% Hochschild Mining (HOC) 184.80p 3.24% Endeavour Mining (EDV) 1,640.00p 3.14% Trainline (TRN) 322.60p 2.48% Aston Martin Lagonda Global Holdings (AML) 149.80p 2.46% Genuit Group (GEN) 464.00p 2.32% Safestore Holdings (SAFE) 859.50p 2.20% Future (FUTR) 1,138.00p 2.15% Fidelity European Trust (FEV) 403.50p 2.15% SSP Group (SSPG) 172.00p 2.14%

FTSE 250 - Fallers

Morgan Advanced Materials (MGAM) 302.00p -2.27% Kier Group (KIE) 153.60p -2.17% GCP Infrastructure Investments Ltd (GCP) 79.50p -1.97% Fidelity China Special Situations (FCSS) 186.00p -1.80% Ocado Group (OCDO) 372.80p -1.69% Domino's Pizza Group (DOM) 296.60p -1.66% Me Group International (MEGP) 192.00p -1.54% Harbour Energy (HBR) 278.90p -1.52% Ithaca Energy (ITH) 130.20p -1.21% Diversified Energy Company (DEC) 1,022.00p -1.16%