Barclays Share News (BARC)

(Alliance News) - Stocks in London are set to open lower on Thursday, taking their cue from stocks on Wall Street which fell after the US Federal Reserve failed to please some investors - and Donald Trump - with the extent of its rate cut. The monetary policy focus now moves to the Bank of England, which releases its own interest rate decision at midday.In early UK company news, Royal Dutch Shell reported a fall in interim earnings, London Stock Exchange Group said it has reached agreement over the acquisition of Refinitiv, and Barclays said it will focus on cost reductions after a "challenging" income environment in the first half. IG says futures indicate the FTSE 100 index of large-caps to open 19.18 points lower at 7,567.60 on Thursday. The FTSE 100 index closed down 59.99 points, or 0.8%, at 7,586.78 on Wednesday.The US Federal Reserve on Wednesday lowered the target range for interest rates by a quarter point - the first cut in just over a decade - bringing the benchmark rate down to 2.00% to 2.25%.Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the reason behind the cut was to sustain the expansion of the US economy, which is growing at an annualized rate of about 2%. He explained that Wednesday's decision should be viewed as a "mid-cycle adjustment to policy" not the beginning of a long series of rate cuts.The rate cut was not enough to please President Donald Trump, who criticized Powell for not going further. "As usual, Powell let us down," Trump said."All of those who were expecting the Fed to do more ended up disappointed, which given how strong some of the recent US data has been recently really shouldn't have been a surprise to anybody. If anything it was the least the Fed could have done without getting an even bigger negative market reaction," said Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets. "Nonetheless US markets threw a tantrum, slipping back sharply, with the Dow posting its worst one day fall since May, while short term bond yields, and the US dollar both pushed higher," he said.Wall Street ended firmly in the red on Wednesday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average ending down 1.2%, the S&P 500 down 1.1% and Nasdaq Composite sliding 1.2%.Significantly, Hewson noted, the decision was not unanimous, with two rate-setters dissenting. With the Fed's interest rate decision known, focus turns to the next central bank meeting in the calendar - the Bank of England. No change is expected from the BoE when the UK central bank releases its latest monetary policy decision at midday, though attention will be paid to Governor Mark Carney at the following press conference, at 1230 BST, for clues as to what the bank could do if the UK crashes out of the EU with no deal. Sterling was quoted at USD1.2118 early Thursday ahead of the decision, down from USD1.2222 at the London equities close on Wednesday."Although a BoE rate cut is unimaginable right now, the heavy sell-off in sterling could invigorate the BoE hawks. And if Boris Johnson lets the pound fall free, then Mark Carney may have no choice but to open the parachute," commented Ipek Ozkardeskaya at London Capital Group.In early UK company news, oil major Shell reported a fall in earnings despite slightly higher production.Current cost of supply earnings attributable to shareholders excluding items was down 13% in the first half to USD8.76 billion. Cash flow from operating operating activities was up 4% to USD19.66 billion.For the second quarter alone, CCS earnings attributable to shareholders excluding items was down 26% year-on-year to USD3.46 billion, which Shell said reflected lower realised oil, gas and LNG prices, weaker realised chemicals and refining margins as well as higher provisions, though this was all partly offset by improved production.Total production available for sale in the half rose 1% on a year before to 3.67 million barrels of oil equivalent per day. In the second quarter alone, this was up 4% to 3.58 million.Shell held its interim dividend at USD0.94. In addition, Shell announced the commencement of the next tranche of its share buyback programme, running through October, with the maximum consideration under this USD2.75 billion. The company intends to buyback at least USD25 billion in shares by the end of 2020.Shell Chief Executive Officer Ben van Beurden commented: "We have delivered good cash flow performance, despite earnings volatility, in a quarter that has seen challenging macroeconomic conditions in refining and chemicals as well as lower gas prices.""The resilience of our Upstream and customer-facing businesses and their ability to generate cash support the delivery of our 2020 outlook, which remains unchanged," he added.Looking ahead, Integrated Gas production in the third quarter is expected to be at the same level seen a year ago, with Upstream production to be higher by around 50,000 to 100,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day year-on-year due to field ramp-ups and the transfer of the Salym asset from the Integrated Gas segment.London Stock Exchange Group confirmed it has agreed to buy financial markets data provider Refinitiv for an enterprise value of USD27 billion in an all-share deal, as it also revealed a slight increase in interim profit.The deal is with a consortium including investment funds affiliated with Blackstone as well as Thomson Reuters. Refinitiv is currently 55% owned by the Blackstone funds and 45% by Thomson Reuters. The transaction will result in the current owners of Refinitiv ultimately holding around a 37% stake in the LSE Group, though less than 30% of its voting rights.Together, LSE Group and Refinitiv generated a combined annual revenue of over GBP6 billion in 2018, which would have made the combined business the largest listed global financial markets infrastructure provider by revenue last year.Separately, LSE Group released its interim results on Thursday, saying they showed a "strong" performance despite challenging market conditions. Total revenue was up 7% to GBP1.02 billion in the six months to June 30 with total income up 8% to GBP1.14 billion. FTSE Russell index revenue was up 9% to GBP315 million, while Post Trade revenue at LCH was up 12% to GBP266 million.LSE Group pretax profit rose slightly to GBP363 million from GBP360 million a year before. Adjusted operating profit was up 11% to GBP533 million.LSE Group increased its interim dividend by 7% to 20.1p. Lender Barclays said it put in a "resilient" performance in the first half of 2019. Pretax profit nearly doubled to GBP3.01 billion from GBP1.66 billion a year ago, though stripping out litigation and conduct charges, was down to GBP3.1 billion from GBP3.7 billion. Net interest income was GBP4.62 billion, up from GBP4.38 billion a year before, though total income fell to GBP9.86 billion from GBP10.36 billion on lower net trading income, net fee and commission income and net investment income.The income environment in the first half was "challenging", the bank said, and as a result Barclays is focused on net cost reductions in the second half. The blue-chip stock expects to reduce costs for 2019 to below the GBP13.6 billion low end of previous cost guidance.Barclays lifted its interim dividend to 3.0p from 2.5p paid out a year ago.Among divisions, Barclays UK pretax profit was up to GBP1.1 billion from GBP800 million a year ago. Corporate & Investment Bank income of GBP5.3 billion was down 1% as a positive performance in fixed income, currencies & commodities and Transaction Banking was offset by a lower Banking fee pool across the industry and reduced client activity in Equities.In Asia on Thursday, the Japanese Nikkei 225 index ended up 0.1%. In China, the Shanghai Composite is down 0.8%, while the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong is also 0.8% lower.Outside of the BoE, the economic events calendar on Thursday has manufacturing PMI readings France at 0850 BST, Germany at 0855 BST, the eurozone at 0900 BST and the UK at 0930 BST.