World markets struggled to make progress today after another meeting on the eurozone debt crisis failed to ease traders’ nerves.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel pledged their commitment to keeping all 17 countries including Greece in the eurozone but the meeting produced nothing substantial enough to allay market fears.
The FTSE 100 Index dropped 37.4 points at 5,612.3 and the renewed nerves around the eurozone hit the banking sector, with Royal Bank of Scotland falling 2% or 0.4p to 20.1p, Barclays dropping 4% or 8.3p to 178.1p, Lloyds Banking Group off 0.9p at 26.2p and HSBC shedding 6.8p to 491.4p.
Retail stocks proved largely resilient despite fresh gloom for the sector after supermarket chain Morrisons revealed lacklustre underlying sales growth of 0.7% over the key Christmas trading period. Its shares rose 0.2p to 311.5p.
It was a mixed picture for rivals Tesco and Sainsbury’s, who are also due to update the market this week. Sainsbury’s made slight gains of 1.2p to 300p but Tesco fell 0.5p to 390.5p, amid expectations it will post one of its weakest Christmas trading updates in several years.
Marks & Spencer was also among the fallers, down 2.2p at 308.5p.
Pharmaceuticals giant GlaxoSmithKline was among the top fallers in the FTSE 100 Index despite it saying it hoped its new lung drug Relovair would be sent for regulatory approval in mid-2012. Shares were down 62p at £14.35, or 4%.
In the FTSE 250 Index, shares in JD Sports Fashion jumped 40p to 700p after it confirmed a deal to buy the bulk of ailing retailer Blacks Leisure including its 290 stores.
The biggest Footsie risers were National Grid up 14.5p at 624p, Burberry ahead 28p at £12.78, Aggreko up 42p at £21.31, and Evraz ahead 7.2p at 393p.
The biggest Footsie fallers included Essar Energy down 8.7p at 162p and Man group off 5.4p at 107.3p
Alan Cockburn, of investment manager and financial planning specialist Brewin Dolphin in Aberdeen, noted that risers included EnQuest which rose 2.69% to 106.6p.
Amongst the fallers, Aberdeen based FirstGroup lost 1.86% at 333.45p and AG Barr dropped 1.72% to 1,172.5p.