ECM.L Share News (ECM)

LONDON (Alliance News) - Stocks in London opened higher on Tuesday with investors hopeful a breakthrough could be made in trade talks between the US and China amid "positive and constructive discussions" in the second day of a two-day meeting in Beijing.In early UK company news, WM Morrison Supermarkets disappointed the market with its Christmas trading update, but survey data from Kantar Worldpanel showed UK grocers as a whole enjoyed a fruitful festive period. The FTSE 100 was up 36.49 points, or 0.5%, at 6,847.37, while the FTSE 250 was 150.86 points higher, 0.5%, at 18,126.73. The AIM All-Share was flat at 887.50.The Cboe UK 100 was up 0.2% at 11,579.75, while the Cboe UK 250 was 0.1% higher at 16,094.65 and the Cboe UK Small Companies flat at 11,0.23.54.In mainland Europe, the CAC 40 in Paris was up 0.5%, while the DAX 30 in Frankfurt was up 0.4%."Stocks in Europe are trading higher and this is despite the fact that there is no clear outcome from fresh talks which are taking place between the US and China over the current trade war. It appears that traders have already priced in a lot of good news and the only outcome they are expecting out of this is mostly positive," said ThinkMarkets analyst Naeem Aslam.Deputy US Trade Representative Jeffrey Gerrish is leading the US team at the two-day meeting, with spokesman for China's Foreign Ministry predicting "positive and constructive discussions".In the FTSE 100, SSE was up 2.2% after Goldman Sachs resumed coverage on the energy supplier with a Buy rating. At the other end of the large cap index, WM Morrison Supermarkets was the worst performer, down 3.5% despite the supermarket chain posting its fourth straight year of Christmas sales growth. For the 9 weeks to January 6, Morrison reported group like-for-like sales excluding fuel up 3.6%, with retail up 0.6% and wholesale up 3.0%. Like-for-like sales including fuel were 3.4% higher.A company-compiled consensus based on 11 analysts forecast Morrisons to have seen retail like-for-like sales up 0.5% and group like-for-like sales up 4.1% in the holiday period, meaning that the retailer fell slightly short of analysts' expectations. "Morrisons still lags in comparison to its larger rivals in the increasingly important channels of online and convenience stores. In addition, the figures overall are shy both of analyst expectations as well as the same period last year," noted Interactive Investor's Richard Hunter. Moreover, the company kept its full-year expectations unchanged despite the good trading achieved in the period."With the bar expected to be high in terms of forthcoming updates from the other supermarkets, the general market consensus of the shares as a Hold tends to suggest that investors consider there to be better value elsewhere," Hunter added. Morrisons was the first of the major UK-listed supermarkets to report an update for the period covering the festive season, with J Sainsbury scheduled to update the market on Wednesday and Tesco on Thursday. As a group, UK supermarkets have achieved record sales growth during the Christmas trading period, painting a "rosier picture" compared to their high street counterparts, according to the latest Kantar Worldpanel grocery market survey. Among the big four supermarkets, Walmart-owned Asda, which is in the process of merging with J Sainsbury to create a new UK market leader, came on top with overall year-on-year sales growth of 0.7% due to online sales increasing by 12%. Its market share however shed 0.1 percentage point to 15.2%. UK's biggest supermarket, Tesco experienced sales growth of 0.6%. Its market share now stands at 27.8%, down 0.3 percentage point compared to last year.Sainsbury's sales fell 0.4% with its market share slipping by 0.3 percentage point to 16.2% from 16.5% a year ago. Shares in Sainsbury's were down 0.6% but Tesco was up 1.4%. Smiths Group was down 2.2% after Merrill Lynch cut the engineer to Underperform from Neutral. Vodafone Group was down 1.1% after RBC Capital double downgraded the telecommunications firm to Underperform from Outperform. In the FTSE 250, Rotork was the best performer, up 5.5% after Merrill Lynch double upgraded the valve actuators maker to Buy from Underperform. Electrocomponents was up 4.4% after Jefferies raised the electrical parts manufacturer to Buy from Hold. Greene King was up 4.7% after the pub operator and brewer reported sales growth in its financial year to date, underpinned by strong trading over the festive season with record Christmas day sales. For the 36 weeks to January 6, the company reported like-for-like sales up 3.2%. Just in the two weeks covering Christmas and the New Year, Greene King said like-for-like sales were up 11%, with GBP7.7 million achieved just on Christmas day, a "record" according to the firm.At the other end of the midcap index, SIG was the worst performer, down 4.9%, after the building products supplier said falling headcount has contributed to reduced operating costs.As a result, SIG expects to report adjusted pretax profit of GBP75 million, which includes a benefit of between GBP2 million and GBP3 million of property profits in the year. In 2017, SIG's underlying pretax profit was GBP79.2 million.Revenue from continuing operations in the year to the end of December decreased by 1.4%, with a further 0.7% decrease from currency and 0.2% from more working days. In 2017, the company generated revenue of GBP2.78 billion.SIG's like-for-like revenue is expected to come in 2.3% lower year-on-year.In the UK, the company said commercial construction demand remained dampened by macroeconomic uncertainty, while house price inflation slowed and secondary housing market transactions continued to fall.The Japanese Nikkei 225 index closed up 0.8%. In China, the Shanghai Composite closed down 0.3%, while the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong ended up 0.2%.In the US on Monday, Wall Street ended higher, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 0.4%, S&P 500 up 0.7% and Nasdaq Composite up 1.3%.The pound was marginally higher quoted at USD1.2765 against USD1.2755 at the London equities close Monday.In domestic political news, British and European officials are discussing the possibility of extending Article 50 due to fears that a Brexit deal may not be approved by March 29, The Daily Telegraph newspaper reported Tuesday, citing three EU sources.The newspaper, citing sources, reported that British officials had been "putting out feelers" and "testing the waters" on extending Article 50 - the UK's formal notice to withdraw from the European Union.The economic events calendar on Tuesday has eurozone consumer confidence at 1000 GMT.