The Footsie slipped 0.2% in the opening minutes, following Friday's move by S&P to downgrade nine Eurozone nations. Meanwhile, cruise ship operator Carnival saw shares drop early on after releasing a statement relating to the grounding of a luxury liner off the Italian coast.Standard & Poor's (S&P) "finally" confirmed on Friday night that both France and Austria have lost their coveted AAA ratings, while the credit ratings of seven other Eurozone countries were also hit by a downgrade. Analysts lowered the long-term ratings on Italy, Spain, Portugal and Cyprus by two notches; France, Austria, Malta, Slovakia and Slovenia by one notch. S&P is clear in stating that these decisions are "primarily driven by our assessment that the policy initiatives that have been taken by European policymakers in recent weeks may be insufficient to fully address ongoing systemic stresses in the Eurozone." Closer to home, economic forecaster Ernst & Young Item club believes that the UK is already in a recession and growth will flat-line this year. Professor Peter Spencer, chief economic advisor to the ITEM Club, said: "Figures for the last quarter of 2011 and the first quarter of this year are likely to show that we are back in recession and we are going to have to wait until this summer before there are any signs of improvement."In other news, Wall Street is closed today for Martin Luther King Jr. day.CARNIVAL DROPS AFTER ASSESSING CRUISE SHIP DISASTERCarnival, the FTSE 100 company which owns the Costa Concordia, the cruise ship which grounded off the coast of Italy at the weekend, says the cost of not having the boat in service will be between $85m and $95m. Shares dropped nearly 20% in early trading.Carnival is the parent company of Costa Cruises, the operator of the Concordia. The death toll from the damaged ship rose to six on Monday morning, as bodies continue to be recovered from the luxury liner, which hit rocks off the island of Giglio in the Mediterranean on Friday evening. Banking giants Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds and Barclays were also out of favour early on.Meanwhile, Morrison was the high riser following last week's sell-off which saw shares lose around 7% of their value. The supermarket chain reported last Monday that like-for-like sales growth had slowed in the third quarter.Exillon Energy was a high riser on the FTSE 250 after the group's average daily production reached 11,055 barrels for the month of December, up from November's 10,935 barrels a day. House builder Bovis Homes rose after saying that pre-tax profits for the year ended 31 December 2011 will be in line with market consensus and it is well positioned to improve returns further in 2012 and beyond.Infrastructure firm Balfour Beatty fell despite announcing that it has been awarded several construction contracts in the commercial sector worth £100m.Milk producer Robert Wiseman Dairies surged after saying turnover and trading for the last fifteen weeks has been in line with expectations, bolstered by increased volumes at the Co-operative and Tesco. Construction services company Interior Services plummeted after warning that group profits for the year to 30 June 2012 will now be below expectations after a further deterioration in UK trading conditions, particularly among food retail and retail banking sectors.FTSE 100 - RisersMorrison (Wm) Supermarkets (MRW) 291.10p +1.32%Smiths Group (SMIN) 946.00p +1.12%Meggitt (MGGT) 368.70p +1.04%Amec (AMEC) 983.00p +0.72%Diageo (DGE) 1,398.00p +0.58%ARM Holdings (ARM) 578.00p +0.52%Pearson (PSON) 1,223.00p +0.49%Royal Dutch Shell 'A' (RDSA) 2,260.50p +0.42%Shire Plc (SHP) 2,174.00p +0.37%Fresnillo (FRES) 1,693.00p +0.36%FTSE 100 - FallersCarnival (CCL) 1,809.00p -19.53%Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 23.39p -2.95%Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 28.75p -2.54%ICAP (IAP) 328.70p -2.38%Barclays (BARC) 197.15p -2.01%Capita (CPI) 645.50p -1.90%G4S (GFS) 265.10p -1.78%Kingfisher (KGF) 247.60p -1.71%Cairn Energy (CNE) 287.60p -1.57%Schroders (Non-Voting) (SDRC) 1,102.00p -1.25%FTSE 250 - RisersLaird (LRD) 159.40p +3.71%COLT Group SA (COLT) 92.80p +2.65%BH Global Ltd. USD Shares (BHGU) 12.05 +2.55%SIG (SHI) 104.90p +2.34%DS Smith (SMDS) 204.60p +2.30%Home Retail Group (HOME) 86.85p +2.18%Exillon Energy (EXI) 277.30p +2.14%Stobart Group Ltd. (STOB) 123.90p +1.81%Rank Group (RNK) 132.00p +1.77%Bovis Homes Group (BVS) 460.80p +1.70%FTSE 250 - FallersSalamander Energy (SMDR) 223.00p -3.30%Regus (RGU) 87.45p -2.83%Debenhams (DEB) 61.35p -2.00%Paragon Group Of Companies (PAG) 173.10p -1.93%Anglo Pacific Group (APF) 270.00p -1.82%Dixons Retail (DXNS) 9.52p -1.75%Ashtead Group (AHT) 217.00p -1.72%Telecom Plus (TEP) 717.00p -1.71%Brown (N.) Group (BWNG) 228.40p -1.55%Kesa Electricals (KESA) 67.25p -1.54%
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