Footsie makes early gains

Two of the driving forces of the London market’s recent bull run were in favour during a positive start to the week for the FTSE 100 Index today.

Oil and mining stocks achieved gains of more than 2%, while property companies were also on the risers board following a positive broker note in the sector.

That enabled the Footsie to overcome a negative session for New York markets last night, with the top flight ahead 22.1 points at 6051.5 by mid-morning.

The weakness on Wall Street reflected general concern about record oil prices of more than 70 US dollars, although this had the opposite effect in London as market heavyweights Royal Dutch Shell and BP both surged.

Shell was up 48p to 2018p, while BP rose 15.5p to 703.5p.

Stronger commodity prices in Australia helped the commodity sector correct losses from Thursday, with copper specialist Kazakhmys up 45p at 1234p and Xstrata stronger by 75p at 2042p.

The gains were matched by British Land, which surged 4% or 53p to 1273p, as UBS raised its price target on the stock to 1450p, from 1200p. The impact was felt by Land Securitie, up 31p at 1920p, and Hammerson, which rose 17p to 1185p.

Among other significant risers, BAA gained after a weekend of developments in relation to its ongoing takeover saga.

Shares were 18p higher at 859.5p as investors digested news that it had rejected a highly conditional approach from a consortium led by Goldman Sachs. It valued BAA at around £9.4 billion, compared with the £8.75 billion proposed by initial bidder Ferrovial.

Investors initially gave a positive reception to a first quarter revenues update from PartyGaming but quickly took money off the table to leave the stock 5% lower, or 7.75p at 144p. Revenues were up 54% but analysts said the continued threat of legislation in the United States continued to hang over the company.