INVESTORS in oil giant Shell sent the FTSE 100 tumbling on Tuesday as London's top index lagged far behind many of its global counterparts.
The oil company's share price suffered a sharp fall after it announced plans to slash up to $22 billion (£18bn) from the value it gives its assets.
It was an acknowledgement from Shell's management that the oil in the ground that it has the rights to extract may not be worth as much as previously estimated.
The news sent both A and B shares in Shell - both of which are listed on the FTSE 100 - down by nearly 4%.
It dealt a double-whammy to the FTSE by also dragging BP lower, weeks after the company made a similar admission of its own.
At the end of the day, the index had dropped 0.9%, or a 56.03 point loss to 6,169.74.
"The FTSE 100 is underperforming against its continental counterparts on account of the bearish moves in Royal Dutch Shell and BP," said CMC Markets analyst David Madden.
The news that the UK's GDP fell faster than first thought in the first three months of the year and a lockdown in Leicester are also likely to have weighed on the index, added Connor Campbell, at Spreadex.
It contrasted the FTSE against more bullish moves from the continent and across the pond.
In Frankfurt, the Dax rose 0.6%, in Paris the Cac 40 index dropped 0.2%, and in New York the Dow Jones and S&P 500 were trading up by 0.3% and 1% shortly after markets closed in Europe.
The price of oil also likely weighed on Shell and BP, with Brent crude dropping 1.2% to $41.20 per barrel.
The pound traded up about 0.6% against both the dollar and the euro, buying 1.2373 and 1.1003 respectively.
In company news, engineering giant Smiths Group leapt to the top of the FTSE 100 with an 8.8% gain as it announced plans to cut jobs and slash costs.
The news that holiday firm On the Beach hit a half-year loss was perhaps not surprising, but shares still dropped by 2.5% as the scale of the devastation was revealed. Pre-tax loss was £34 million compared with a £12m profit a year earlier.
EasyJet fell by 1% after union Balpa said the company is considering plans to lay off 700 pilots and close bases at Stansted, Southend and Newcastle airports.
Intercontinental Hotels took a 2% hit on the news that the Holiday Inn owner believes revenue has more than halved over the past six months.
Finally, housebuilder Redrow dropped 6.8% as it announced plans to scale back operations in London after a profit warning caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
The biggest risers on the FTSE 100 were Smiths Group, up 114p to 1,412p, Ferguson, up 146p to 6,612p, Polymetal, up 26p to 1,615.5p, M&G, up 2.25p to 167.55p, and Informa, up 5.9p to 470.4p.
The biggest fallers on the FTSE 100 were Shell 'A', down 52.8p to 1,287p, Shell 'B', down 46.8p to 1,224p, IAG, down 8.4p to 222.2p, BAE Systems, down 12.3p to 483.4p, and BP, down 7.7p to 307.2p.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here