FTSE 100 live: HSBC and Glencore weigh on London’s premier index
HSBC was the latest bank to announce results, following Barclays yesterday and Natwest last week, but markets were not impressed.
HSBC and Glencore weighed on the FTSE 100 after markets were disappointed with the pair’s latest results, dragging the capital’s premier index into the red on Wednesday morning.
The FTSE 100 was trading 0.87 per cent lower at 7,652.28 although the FTSE 250 index, which is more aligned with the health of the domestic economy, picked up 0.07 per cent to 19,124.43.
HSBC was the latest bank to announce results, following Barclays yesterday and Natwest last week, but markets were not impressed.
Its shares lost 7.5 per cent after it reported a $3bn write-down on its holdings in China’s Bank of Communications.
Traders were also concerned by 80 per cent fall in HSBC’s fourth quarter profits, which soured the announcement of a new $2bn buyback.
“Backing out a lot of the mess, it looks like performance was a little worse than expected with higher operating costs more than offsetting slightly better impairments,” Matt Britzman, equity analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown said.
Shares in Glencore lost 4.5 after the mining giant reported a drop in profit and cut shareholder returns.
The firm’s full-year 2023 figures showed the group reported earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) of $17.1bn in 2023, down by around half compared to a year ago.
In line with its policy to return a set percentage of profits to investors, the company lowered its base dividend to $1.6bn (£1.3bn) or 10p per share. However, the group did not announce an additional cash return by way of a share buyback as it has done in the past.
BAE Systems also lost three per cent on Wednesday, despite reporting a strong set of results.
Britain’s premier defence contractor’s orrder backlog hit £69.8bn for the 12 months to 31 December, driven by an order intake of £37.7bn. It followed a number of significant contract awards, including for the ‘AUKUS’ submarine program and Dreadnought nuclear deterrent submarines.
