No change for London's leading shares

London’s leading shares hovered around opening levels this morning as a raft of company news failed to ignite trading.

By mid-morning, the FTSE 100 Index made marginal gains of just 5.2 points to stand at 3734.7.

The lacklustre start came despite a 10% gain from pubs and hotels group Six Continents, after it emerged pubs entrepreneur Hugh Osmond was planning a multi-billion takeover bid for the group.

Shares in the group, which is in the midst of separating its pubs business from its hotels arm, jumped 54.5p to 609p on hopes of a bid.

Standard Chartered bank also gained pace with a near-7% gain on the back of rising profits and a cut in its provisions for bad debts. The shares rose 46p to 708.5p.

However the rises failed to liven the wider market, which hovered around its opening level.

A surge on Wall Street last night after US traders returned from their extended weekend, also failed to boost trading.

Weighing on the market was cleaning products giant Reckitt Benckiser, which shed 7% after announcing a large share placing, along with its full year results. Shares tumbled 74p to 971p.

Invensys was again in trouble, losing a further 6% or 1.25p as traders continued to punish the shares for a shock profits warning last week which saw the company halve in value overnight. Today the shares were at 19p by mid-morning.

Insurer Royal & Sun Alliance also put pressure on the market after a broker downgrade. Shares fell 3.25p to 93.75p.

Outside the Footsie, logistics group Christian Salvesen tumbled recovered some ground after early morning losses.

By mid-morning it was 17% down after issuing a shock profits warning that profits would fall 20% below expectations. Shares tumbled 7p to 34.5p.