Telecom shares continued Friday’s rally today, and sparked ahead in early trading.
After the first hour, telecom equipment group Energis was up 9%, rising 9p to 117p, while under-pressure Marconi rose 2p to 93p.
Colt Telecom jumped 7p to 345p, BT was up 4p at 478p and Vodafone rose 1p to 146p.
However, despite the upbeat sentiment in the sector, the FTSE-100 Index started the week with its head below water, falling 4.2 points to 5398.9 at 9am.
The subdued start follows Friday’s rally, when shares ended a difficult week on a high note with tech and telecom stocks bouncing higher to push the FTSE ahead by 117 points.
Today, it was media and banking stocks which were under pressure.
Pearson fell 3%, off 35p at £10.03. The group reported half-year operating profits 18% ahead but said profits at its Financial Times business had been hit by the downturn in the advertising market.
Other media stocks under pressure included WPP, off 13p at 699p, Reuters down 14p at 818p and BSkyB down 11p at 767p.
Banking shares were also putting pressure on the market, with Standard Chartered down 5p at 808p, HSBC off 5p at 787p, Barclays slipping 3p to £19.80 and Lloyds off 7p at 694p.
EGi News 30/07/01
