This Morning in London headline shares were modestly lower in early deals, with the financial sector remaining under pressure. Commodity stocks were also lower following the trend of profit-taking in Asia and on reports by German business paper Finanz & Wirtschaft that Rio Tinto (RIO) may sell new shares to preserve its A-rating with rating companies. Rio Tinto was down 31p at 4,197.5p, BHP Billiton (BLT) was 6p lower at 1,744p and Antofagasta (ANTO) was off 20.5p at 742p. On the upside, Tate & Lyle (TATE) was the top riser, rallying 9.5p at 412p after Barron's reported the group may be vulnerable to a takeover from a big food company such as Nestle (NSTR). The group was bouncing back after falling 28% on Friday after issuing a profit warning. At 9:50 the FTSE-100 was 19.6 points lower at 6,466.8, while the FTSE-250 was down 2.1 points at 11,037.4.
BROKER RECOMMENDATIONS
Citigroup initiates coverage of Big Yellow Group (BYG) with a buy and 600p target price.
The broker upgrades Clipper Windpower (CWP) to hold from sell.
Deutsche Bank downgrades ITV (ITV) to hold from buy.
Goldman Sachs downgrades Tate & Lyle (TATE) to neutral from buy and Abbot Group (ABG) to sell from neutral and initiates coverage of Expro International (EXR) with a neutral and Petrofac (PFC) with a neutral.
The broker downgrades Pipex (PXC) to neutral from buy and downgrades Tate & Lyle (TATE) to neutral from buy.
Landsbanki has a buy for Biffa (BIFF), a hold for Shanks (SKS), a buy for Cookson (CKSN), a buy for Holidaybreak (HBR), a buy for Synergy Healthcare (SYR) and downgrades Vernalis (VER) to hold from buy.
Merrill Lynch upgrades FKI (FKI) to neutral from sell.
JP Morgan has an overweight for WPP Group (WPP) cutting target to 807p to 894p and has a neutral on Tate & Lyle (TATE), cutting target to 233p from 243p.
Numis has upgraded 2ergo (RGO) to buy from add 285p, Abcam (ABC) to add from hold 357p, Babcock (BAB) to buy from add 625p, Chemring (CHG) to buy from add £23, Debtmatters (DEBT) to buy from add 100p, ITE (ITE) to add from hold 207p, Phoenix IT (PNX) to buy from add 520p and Tate and Lyle (TATE) to add from reduce 450p.
The broker had downgraded Rok (ROK) to add from buy 248p and RWS (RWS) to hold from add 320p.
Seymour Pierce has buys for Debts.co.uk (DETS), Eckoh (ECK), Imperial Energy (IEC) and WSP (WSH) has outperform for Vialogy (VIY) and downgrades Biffa (BIFF) to outperform from buy.
NEWS ROUND-UP
Last Friday in New York the Dow Jones booked a strong September gain of 4%, the best monthly gain for the index since May of this year, and the best September performance since 1997. For the quarter, the Dow gained 3.6% leading to a year-to-date gain of 11.5%. The S&P fell 4.6 points to 1,526. But the broad index rose 3.6% for the month, 1.5% for the third quarter, and is up 7.6% for the year so far. The Nasdaq was down 8.1 points at 2,701. The tech-heavy index gained 4% in September, 3.8% for the quarter, and 11.8% year to date.
