LONDON MARKET PRE-OPEN: BP Earnings Surge; Ocado Annual Loss Widens

LONDON (Alliance News) - Stock prices in London are seen opening higher on Tuesday tracking overnight gains in the US, while the pound was lower ahead of UK services PMI data. In early corporate news, oil major BP reported strong annual results, while Ocado's annual loss widened on increased investment. IG futures indicate the FTSE 100 index is to open up 33.87 points at 7,068.00. The blue chip index closed up 13.91 points, or 0.2%, at 7,034.13 on Monday. "Europe is looking firmer heading towards the open as it takes its lead from closing strength on Wall Street and continued caution from the US Federal Reserve boosting risk appetite," said London Capital's Jasper Lawler.In the US on Monday, Wall Street ended higher, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 both up 0.7%, and the Nasdaq Composite up 1.2%.US stocks ended higher for the fourth straight session after President Donald Trump told CBS trade talks with Beijing are "doing very well" and he sees a "good chance" of reaching a deal with North Korea on denuclearisation.In the US earnings calendar, film and television companies Walt Disney and Twenty-First Century Fox will report earnings after the market close in New York. BP said earnings for 2018 came in comfortably ahead of consensus, more than doubling on the prior year, with Upstream in particular doing well.For 2018, BP's underlying replacement cost profit, the oil major's preferred metric, came in at USD12.72 billion, up from USD6.17 billion in 2017. Market consensus had seen a figure of USD11.88 billion.Fourth quarter underlying RC profit was USD3.48 billion, up from USD2.11 billion the same period a year before. Expectations had been for underlying RC profit of USD2.63 billion. Group production in 2018 was 3.7 million barrels of oil equivalent a day on average, 2.4% higher than in 2017, with Upstream production increasing 3.0% year-on-year excluding Rosneft to 2.5 million barrels of oil equivalent per day. BP increased its fourth quarterly dividend by 2.5% on the year to 10.25 US cents. It bought back USD355 million of shares in 2018, and plans to keep buybacks going, and to "fully offset the impact of scrip dilution" by the end of 2019. Ocado Group said its "transformation journey is well under way" but saw annual profit constrained by increased investment over the year. For 2018, revenue rose 12% to GBP1.59 billion from GBP1.45 billion last year and gross profit rose 12% to GBP424.5 million from GBP378.9 million the year before. However, the company posted a widened loss of GBP44.9 million from a loss of GBP9.8 million last year.Ocado said profitability was hurt by continued investments in its platform and share-based senior management incentive charges following the significant share price increase in the year. In addition, there were also additional depreciation following the opening of its Erith customer fulfilment centre, it added. The company also said it would continue to target further Solutions deals, which would generate additional cash fees but would have a detrimental effect on short term profit.The company did not declare a dividend. "Assuming economic conditions remain broadly stable, we remain confident in achieving revenue growth in our Retail business of between 10% to 15% in the 2019 financial year as we increase our fulfilment capacity and grow market share in the UK. As volumes grow, and we expand utilisation of our new CFCs, we will continue to find efficiencies in our business and as such we expect further growth in Retail earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation," the company said. DCC said operating profit for the third quarter ended December 31 was "significantly ahead" of last year and in line with expectations. The Irish distribution group's operating profit grew strongly across its Liquefied Petroleum Gas, Healthcare, Technology and Retail & Oil divisions, which all delivered robust performances. "Notwithstanding the milder winter weather conditions, DCC expects operating profit [for the year ending March 31] will be significantly ahead of the prior year and will be in line with current market consensus expectations," the company said. Troubled retailer Carpetright said overall performance remained in line with expectations, but like-for-like sales were negative during the 13 week period to January 26. The company said trading patterns have "remained volatile week to week", against a backdrop of uncertainty and weak consumer confidence. However, the trend has improved from that of the first half.Carpetright remains on track to achieve the GBP19 million of annualised cash savings announced as part of its restructuring plans. The pound was marginally lower, quoted at USD1.3042 early Tuesday against USD1.3059 at the London equities close Monday, ahead of the UK services PMI reading at 0930 GMT."Services activity for so long a strong performer last year saw a drop off towards the end of last year and this may well have filtered over into this year as well. In December we saw activity come in at 51.2 after a weak November, and with retail activity also looking weak we shouldn't rule out a similarly lacklustre reading," said CMC Markets chief market analyst Michael Hewson.UK retail sales returned to growth in January as heavy discounting tempted cautious shoppers, the latest BRC-KPMG Retail Sales Monitor figures showed on Tuesday.Data covering the four weeks to January 26, showed sales up 2.2% from a year before, the highest annual growth since June and above both the 3-month and 12-month averages of 0.8% and 1.2% respectively.In December, total sales were flat compared to the prior year, marking the worst December performance since 2008.The Japanese Nikkei 225 index closed down 0.2%. Financial markets in China and Hong Kong were closed for the Lunar New Year holiday. Still to come in the economic calendar in Europe is services PMI readings from Italy, France, Germany, and eurozone at 0845 GMT, 0850 GMT, 0855 GMT, 0900 GMT respectively. There is also the latest grocery market share data from Kantar Worldpanel at 0800 GMT.