The UK stock market rebound in early trade Friday after two days of declines, with mining and oil shares leading recovering previous losses. The benchmark FTSE 100 adds 30 points, or about 0.3%, to 4% at 6,710 in early deals.
Mining peers such as Anglo American (AAL), BHP Billiton (BLT), Glencore (GLEN), Rio Tinto (RIO) and Antofagasta (ANTO) all head higher on Friday morning, rebounding after some heavy losses the previous session.
Oil driller Tullow Oil (TLW) heads the Footsie leader board as crude prices recover after hitting multi-year lows last week. That also helps Royal Dutch Shell (RDSB), BG (BG.) and BP (BP.) also put in decent gains in London.
Elsewhere in the sector, mid cap oil play Ophir Energy (OPHR) slips 3.8% to 173.3p as it announces a dry well in Tanzania and confirms an all-paper offer for rival Salamander Energy (SMDR) of £266.9 million. The latter ticks up 1.9% to 92.5p - a rival offer on the table from a consortium led by Spanish firm CEPSA was apparently worth 121p in cash (with a further contingent 24p) before it walked away (18 Nov).
British Gas-owner Centrica (CNA) extends losses after yesterday's earnings warning, when the energy supplier cut earnings guidance on the back of mild weather.
On the junior market, investors continue to read positives into yesterday's Microsoft's (MSFT:NDQ) Cloud Solution Provider Program for cloud business optimisation play Outsourcery (OUT:AIM). Having soared 73% on Thursday the shares continue to climb, shooting another 43% higher to 21.5p, making it the biggest AIM riser.
Controversy hit insurance claims outsourcer Quindell (QPP:AIM) continues yesterday's rally, shooting another 29% up on Friday to 69.25p. Investors are clearly hoping the departure of founder Rob Terry can draw a line under the stock's dismal showing during much of 2014.
Back among larger companies, optimism on the US economy helps tool and equipment hire outfit Ashtead (AHT) 1.3% higher to £10.43. Prospects for Ashtead’s North American Sunbelt division were boosted by a read-across from the Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank (Philly Fed) Manufacturing Business Outlook Survey for November. It showed increasing business activity for the ninth consecutive month.
Large cap cyclicals in the financial services sector also creep higher. Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) is up 1.79% to 997p; Aberdeen Asset Management (ADN) trades 1.1% higher at 451p and Schroders (SDR) rises 0.84% to £26.42.
Shares recently highlighted that toymaker Hornby (HRN) could be about to rebound and today’s results are encouraging. Shares in the Scalextrix, Corgi and Airfix models maker rise 1.4% to 73p as the company reports group profit of £0.25 million for the six months ended 30 September and a particularly encouraging 18% rise in sales of its model rail products. Chief executive Richard Ames says full year results will depend on the success of the Christmas trading, but that 'current indications are that it will meet our expectations,’ he says.
Chinese wooden doors-to-home furnishings designer Jiasen International (JSI:AIM) edges 0.5p higher to 74.5p on an encouraging nine month trading statement. Sales grew 10% to RMB 652.8 million and the order book increased, though the company, which this month purchased land for a new production facility, does also flag a decrease in gross margins.
