AGK.L Share News (AGK)

LONDON (Alliance News) - Stocks in London opened mixed on Tuesday with gains from housebuilders offset by a drop from BHP Billiton in the FTSE 100. The FTSE 100 index was down 0.1%, or 8.68 points, at 7,582.58. The mid-cap FTSE 250 index was flat at 20,533.82. The AIM All-Share index was down 0.1% at 1,079.67.The Cboe UK 100 was down 0.2% at 12,855.86, the Cboe UK 250 was down 0.1% at 18,649.77, and the Cboe UK Small Companies was down 0.1% at 12,205.39.On the London Stock Exchange, Persimmon was the best blue chip performer at the open, up 1.2% after the housebuilder recorded a rise in earnings.For the six months to the end of June, pretax profit totaled GBP516.5 million, up 13% from GBP457.4 million the year before, as revenue grew 5% to GBP1.84 billion from GBP1.75 billion.Persimmon said it sold 8,402 homes during the period, up from 7,794 the prior year, with the average selling price of those homes standing at GBP215,813, up 1.2% from GBP213,262.Chief executive Jeff Fairburn - who has come under heavy fire over his pay package in recent months - said the group is also set to deliver further "high-quality, sustainable growth". Earlier this month, Fairburn was named top of a High Pay Centre list of the 10 highest-paid CEOs in 2017.Persimmon returned 118.2 pence per share in the first half as part of an ongoing capital return programme, down from 126.5 pence per share distributed in the same period a year ago."The UK government's Help to Buy scheme remains a tailwind, as does the historically low interest rate environment and few problems surrounding mortgage availability. There is a high quality land bank in reserve, outlook comments are positive and the strength of Persimmon's cash generation has enabled the continuation of a generous return to shareholders, where a prospective dividend yield of 9.6% is eye-watering," said Interactive Investor's Richard Hunter. Fellow housebuilders Berkeley Group, Taylor Wimpey and Barratt Developments were up 0.5%, 0.4% and 0.3%, respectively. At the other end of the large cap index, BHP Billiton was the worst performer, down 1.8% after the Anglo-Australian miner paid out to shareholders above its policy level, although annual profit fell short of consensus.For the 12 months to June, pretax profit rose to USD14.75 billion from USD11.14 billion the prior year, while underlying earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation was up 20% to USD23.18 billion.This excludes US shale operations, since sold off to oil major BP, and falls short of analyst consensus of USD24.31 billion underlying Ebitda. Including US shale, the figure was USD24.11 billion.The total dividend for BHP's financial year was 118 cents, far higher than the 83 cents paid out a year earlier and above analyst consensus of a 116 cents return.In the FTSE 250, Aggreko was the best performer, up 4.7% after HSBC raised the temporary power generator supplier to Buy from Hold. The Japanese Nikkei 225 index closed up 0.1%. In China, the Shanghai Composite is up 1.3%, while the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong is up 0.6%.Asian stock markets are higher following the modest gains overnight on Wall Street amid optimism over US-China trade talks. The dollar declined after a report from Reuters said that US President Donald Trump accused China, as well as Europe, of manipulating their currencies and also said he was "not thrilled" with Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell for raising interest rates.The pound was up against the dollar quoted at USD1.2830 compared to USD1.2761 on Monday.On Tuesday, Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab will travel to Brussels for a further round of talks with the EU's chief negotiator Michel Barnier.Raab said that, while he believed a deal was still "by far the most likely outcome" of the negotiations, a responsible government needed to set out the steps it was taking to mitigate the risks of a 'no-deal' break.Still to come in the economic calendar in Europe is UK public sector borrowing figures at 0930 BST. In mainland Europe, the CAC 40 in Paris was up 0.1% while the DAX 30 in Frankfurt was up 0.2% early Tuesday.The euro was higher against the dollar quoted at USD1.1510, from USD1.1437 at the European equities close Monday.