LONDON MARKET OPEN: Trade Steadies In Europe After Wall Street Dives

(Alliance News) - The FTSE 100 fell only modestly in opening trade on Thursday despite a steep decline on Wall Street overnight, with the mood milder following Wednesday's global recession-driven losses.The FTSE 100 was down 10.04, or 0.1%, at 7,137.84, while the FTSE 250 was up 56.89 points, or 0.3%, at 18,787.94. The AIM All-Share was down 0.1% at 864.12.The Cboe UK 100 index was up 0.1% at 12,097.88. The Cboe UK 250 was up 0.2% at 16,717.34, while the Cboe UK Small Companies was flat at 10,846.06.In mainland Europe, the CAC 40 in Paris and the DAX 30 in Frankfurt were both 0.2% higher in opening trade."Markets look a little steadier at the start of trading today but days like today can be like the good old British weather, sunny in the morning and storms by lunch time. In these markets, I wouldn't be surprised to see a rollercoaster of a day and there's plenty of data coming throughout to provide the catalyst," said Craig Erlam at Oanda.The calmer start in Europe comes despite a sharp sell-off on Wall Street overnight, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average ending down more 800 points, or 3.1%, the S&P 500 down 2.9% and the Nasdaq Composite down 3.0%."UK retail sales this morning will obviously be of interest, following the contraction in the second quarter, and this will be followed by a whole host of releases from the US later on to really shake things up," said Erlam. "Also expect plenty more on the trade war and yield curves, which means much attention on the president's Twitter account."The economic events calendar on Thursday has UK retail sales at 0930 BST followed by US retail sales at 1330 BST.In Asia on Thursday, the Japanese Nikkei 225 index ended down 1.2%. In China, however, the Shanghai Composite closed up 0.3%, while the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong was trading up 0.7%.Alex Kuptsikevich, analyst at FxPro, noted that while the mood in global markets is downbeat, equities in Shanghai and Hong Kong have moved away from the session's lows. "Thus, there is a very high chance that the markets will recover self-possession, and without any fresh disturbing news, they may well return to cautious buying, offsetting the news about the inversion of the yield curve," said Kuptsikevich.Gathered at the bottom of the FTSE 100 were a number of ex-dividend stocks, with lender Royal Bank of Scotland down 7.4%, Russian steelmaker Evraz down 3.3% and Royal Dutch Shell 'A' and 'B' shares down 1.5% and 1.4% respectively.In addition, RBS was cut by analysts at HSBC to Hold from Buy.The situation was similar in the FTSE 250, with iron ore pellet producer Ferrexpo down 3.4%, brick maker Ibstock down 3.3%, and subprime lender Provident Financial down 2.8%.At the top of the FTSE 250 was betting firm firm GVC Holdings, up 4.8% after raising its annual outlook despite turning to an interim loss.Net gaming revenue was up to GBP1.81 billion in the first six months of 2019 from GBP1.13 billion a year ago, though the company swung to a loss of GBP12.3 million from a GBP113.6 million profit a year ago.GVC said it booked GBP224.4 million in pretax costs related to the non-cash amortisation of recent acquisitions. On an underlying basis, pretax profit was up 31% to GBP212.1 million from GBP162.1 million.UK Retail like-for-like net gaming revenue was down 10% in the half, an outcome the group described as "ahead of expectations".With an outperformance in UK Retail, and with Online and European Retail trading in-line with expectations, GVC now expects to deliver full-year earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation within a range of GBP650 million to GBP670 million. In May, the company had said it expected annual Ebitda of around GBP646 million."The group's performance in the first half was extremely pleasing with group proforma [net gaming revenue] 5% ahead. Online momentum remains very strong with proforma NGR 17% ahead, delivering continued market share gains across all major territories," said Chief Executive Kenneth Alexander.On London's junior AIM market, ASOS was down 4.4% after Jefferies cut the online clothing retailer to Underperform from Buy.Elsewhere in the UK, Jeremy Corbyn has challenged opposition parties and Tory rebels to install him as caretaker prime minister until a general election in order to prevent a no-deal Brexit under Boris Johnson.The Labour leader said the administration would be "strictly time-limited" and that he would seek an extension to the Article 50 process to delay the UK leaving the EU past the October 31 deadline.Corbyn asked Westminster's opposition leaders and key Tory rebels to support a no-confidence vote he plans to seek at the "earliest opportunity when we can be confident of success".But the Liberal Democrats dismissed the Labour leader as being the right person to lead a temporary government, while Downing Street criticised him for planning to "overrule the referendum".