UK stocks : FTSE 100 gains 0.1 pct
Agencies: London, Nov 22 2012, 05:06 IST
UK stock closing: UK shares rebounded from early falls for the second session in a row on Wednesday, with a rising oil price supporting energy stocks to lead British blue chips higher.The FTSE 100 index gained 3.93 points, or 0.1 percent, to finish at 5,752.03 points in thin trade of only 85 percent of the average 90 day volume.Energy stocks added 5 points to the index, supported by a spike in the oil price, which gained more than $1 after a bomb blast in Tel Aviv threatened to derail hopes for a truce between Israel and Palestine and raised the prospect of a wider regional conflict."We have seen in the last couple of hours people coming in for the energy names, albeit in low volumes," Steve Asfour, head of sales trading at Fox Davies Capital, said."It's probably a read-across from the oil price spike and there's some really depressed oil and gas stocks really coming back into play."One such stock was BG, which led FTSE 100 gainers, rising 2.8 percent. The gas company had shed over a quarter of its value in less than a month after forecasting no growth in 2013 in a trading update.Utilities also supported the rise, led by a 1.9 percent rise in United Utilities after a clarification by sector regulators struck a more conciliatory tone."The softening of Ofwat's stance on a Competition Commission referral reduces the near-term risk of negative newsflow and highlights how important a consensus driven outcome is to this process," JPMorgan said
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