London afternoon: RBS's rights plans disappoint

Share prices are drifting lower as investors take stock following the market's recent strong run.Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is lower on reports that it is mulling a share issue of between £3-4bn to reduce its dependence on the UK government's toxic asset protection scheme (APS). Lloyds confirmed last week that it too wants to reduce its participation in the scheme, but its plans were a lot more grandiose than RBS's and aimed at completely freeing it of the government's grasp. In contrast, RBS's plans seem aimed merely at keeping the government's stake at around 70% after participation in the government's Asset Protection Scheme (APS). Weaker metal prices have Randgold, Xstrata, Kazakhmys, Vedanta and Rio Tinto in the red. Even Antofagasta is lower now despite a positive note from Goldman Sachs. The US investment bank has upgraded Fags from 'neutral' to 'buy'. It has also turned more bullish on Kazakhmys, but Citigroup cut the stock from 'buy' to 'hold'. Citi likes the look of ENRC, however, and lifted it to 'buy' from 'hold'.Investors have pocketed a tidy profit from last week's good run at Tullow Oil, prompted by two big oil discoveries. Sector peer BG Group, which announced its own big oil discovery last week, is also on the slide and is now trading lower than it was before it announced a huge find in the Santos Basin, offshore Brazil.Punch Taverns has bought back another tranche of convertible debt due for redemption next year, reducing the amount outstanding to just over £100m. The pub owner has bought a total of 33.9% of the original nominal value of the 5% convertible bonds due 2010. The bonds will be cancelled.Land Securities has sold its one third ownership of the famous Bullring shopping centre in Birmingham to the Future Fund, an investment fund for the Australian Government, for £210m. ITV is down as the tough negotiations over the appointment of Tony Ball as its new chief executive continue. ITV are balking at the former BSkyB man's reported £30m pay package demand.Northern Foods, the company behind Goodfella's pizza and Fox's biscuits, has announced that Andrew Booker is to stand down as finance director. He is to be replaced by Simon Herrick, who is currently finance director of Comet owner Kesa Electricals. Booker will remain as finance director until December 31.Oil and gas firm Soco said the Vietnamese government has approved the development plan for the Te Giac Trang (TGT) field. First Oil from the TGT Field is targeted for mid-2011 and tenders for a number of long lead items are already under evaluation. A contract for the floating, production, storage and offloading vessel is currently being finalised, it added.Wellstream, which designs and manufactures equipment for the oil and gas industry, is lower after it said chief executive Gordon Chapman isn't expected to return until 15 January 2010. It has appointed Alasdair MacDonald as a director and acting chief executive officer while Gordon Chapman recovers from surgery. Velosi, the provider of engineering services to oil and gas firms, reported a 10.4% hike in half year pre-tax profit and is confident it will achieve a 'good result for the year'.Shares in Portrait Software improved after the customer interaction software developer said it expects to swing to a profit in the first half.Chinese renewable energy company China Biodiesel said the company's sales bottomed out in February and have steadily increased since then. Sales volumes in the first half of 2009 were up 12% to 15,018 tons from 13,418 tons a year earlier, but sales revenue over the same period fell 34% to RMB 59.19m from RMB 89.51m, reflecting the slump in fuel prices.