LONDON (Alliance News) - After a sizeable jump on Tuesday, London-listed equities opened lower Wednesday, with the usual suspects, oil and mining companies, weighing down stock indices.
The FTSE 100 was down 0.6% at 6,278.08 points. The FTSE 250 was down 0.4% at 17,506.38, and the AIM All-Share was down 0.1% at 732.18.
In the final trading session of the year for Paris and Frankfurt, the French CAC 40 was down 0.5% just after the open and the German DAX 30 down 0.3%.
In Asia on Wednesday, the Nikkei 225 index in Tokyo closed up 0.3%, in its final trading session of the year. The Shanghai Composite ended up 0.3% while the Hang Seng in Hong Kong closed down 0.5%.
It was a familiar story in London, with oil companies and miners amongst the worst performers in the FTSE 100, dragging the entire index down. BP was off 1.6%, BHP Billiton 1.5% and Glencore 1.2%.
Energy stocks were lower after an oil price rally on Tuesday fizzled. At the London close on Tuesday, Brent was quoted at USD37.65 a barrel and went on to make a high of USD37.96. Just after the open on Wednesday, Brent oil traded at USD37.34 a barrel.
In individual company news, RusPetro traded up 16% after it said it reached an agreement with lender PJSC Bank Otkritie Financial Corp to alter the covenants on its loan facilities.
RusPetro, a West Siberia-focused oil and gas development and production company, said the loan covenants on all three facilities with Bank Otkritie have been amended under the agreement.
"This is an important achievement for the group, as it aligns our loan covenants to the group's drilling programme as disclosed in the group's half-year results statement," said John Conlin, RusPetro's chief executive.
Travel company Minoan Group said it has been advised the presidential decree approval process for its resort project in Crete is close to completing and said the terms of its joint venture agreement have been amended.
Minoan said the joint venture agreement has been altered so that its joint venture partners will have the right to increase their stake in the project by 25% for GBP12.5 million after the presidential decree is issued. The partners, which include Candia Investment Corp and others, currently hold 10%. The stock traded up 14%.
Media technology company Mirada was up 11% after it said its pretax loss narrowed slightly as its revenue edged higher in the financial half year to the end of September.
The group said it made a pretax loss of GBP812,000 in the half, compared to a GBP887,000 loss a year earlier, as revenue rose to GBP2.3 million from GBP2.2 million, boosted by the roll-out of its Iris Inspire product over the Televisa cable network in Mexico.
Mirada said the roll-out of the Televisa project was ahead of schedule, with two further networks in Mexico also due to roll-out its products by the end of the current financial year to the end of March.
Mining development and exploration investment company Ortac Resources Ltd said its pretax loss more than halved in the first half as it slashed operating costs to cope with the tough commodities market.
Ortac's pretax loss for the half was GBP342,000, compared to GBP791,000 a year earlier, after the company cut costs at its sites in Slovakia and its head office in London.
The company traded down 8.0%.
In the economic calendar, eurozone private loan and M3 money supply data are at 0900 GMT. Later in the day, US MBA mortgage applications are at 1200 GMT, pending home sales are at 1500 GMT and Energy Information Administration crude oil stock is at 1530 GMT.
By Neil Thakrar; neilthakrar@alliancenews.com; @NeilThakrar1
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