London afternoon: Gloomy mood continues

Blue chips are stuck in the red as Wall Street failed to arouse much enthusiasm and miners continue to wallow in negative territory as dollar strength trims commodity prices.US company earnings have been largely well-received, but talks about currency tensions at this weekend's G20 meeting in Korea are making traders cautious.Lonmin, Eurasian Natural Resources Corp, Vedanta and Anglo American are lower, but much of the attention is focused on IPOs.AIA, the Asian arm of the American insurance giant AIG, is raising $20.5bn from the float, which it priced at HK$19.68, at the top of the indicated range. The price values AIA at $30.5bn - exactly matching the price Prudential eventually baulked at paying earlier this year after months of shilly-shallying.Meanwhile online betting firm Betfair has priced its London float at 1,300p, valuing it at a more modest £1.39bn.Legal & General is red-faced as it revealed its third quarter results more than two weeks early after sending them to analysts last night by mistake. Included were figures revealing total worldwide new business on an annual premium equivalent (APE) basis of £466m in the three months to 30 September, taking the nine-month number to £1.35bn, up 27% on 2009. Elsewhere, BSkyB is higher after it added more customers than expected in the first quarter, boosting revenue by 15% and profit by 25%, but there's no word on News Corp's bid to take over the satellite broadcaster. Net customer growth of 96,000 in the three months to 30 September took the total to 9.96m, while a 12% increase in net product growth of 989,000 was a record. African Barrick Gold's profit fell 8% during the third quarter and revenue dipped 1%. Net income dropped to $40m during the three months to 30 September from $43m a year ago and sales of $209m compare with $211m in 2009. The company, which recently slashed production forecasts at its Buzwagi operation following a huge fuel theft, blamed the quarterly drop in revenue on a drop in ounces sold, though this was partially offset by 29% increase in the average realised gold price to $1,233 an ounce.Home credit group Provident Financial played down the possible impact of the government's welfare and spending cuts even though its core customer base are low to middle income earners. Events and publishing group UBM's trading environment is improving steadily with revenue for the nine months up 3.9% to £643m (Sept 2009: £619m) and underlying revenue up 2.1%.Internet gambling firm PartyGaming, which is merging with rival bwin Interactive Entertainment, raised revenue by 9% in the third quarter and has named Simon Duffy as chairman of the enlarged group.