London midday: Respectable gains for Footsie

Gains in London are now approaching respectable, buoyed by strong demand for heavy hitters in the pharmaceuticals and energy sectors.Anglo-Swedish drugs giant AstraZeneca is the best performer after it received a favourable US ruling in its battle to keep control of the patents to its best-selling cholesterol-lowering drug Crestor. Sector peer GlaxoSmithKline rises in sympathy.BP is also higher with the company having been "put in play" in the eyes of some by a note from JPMorgan Cazenove which suggested the company is ripe for plucking by a stronger rival such as Exxon Mobil. Meanwhile, the FT says Anadarko, a 25% partner to BP on the Macondo prospect in the Gulf of Mexico, approved several key aspects of the UK company's designs for the project. Elsewhere in the oil sector Essar Energy, Petrofac and Cairn are going well.Mining leviathan Rio Tinto is to raise its stake in Ivanhoe Mines by 7.3% to 29.6% and provide sufficient funds to Ivanhoe to continue the development of the Oyu Tolgoi copper and gold complex as scheduled. Asia-focused bank Standard Chartered confirmed the well-flagged story that it is to buy into the Agricultural Bank of China. The bank is buying $500m of the H shares being floated by Agricultural Bank of China, one of the top four commercial banks in China.Insurer Resolution is higher after returning from suspension and ahead of the deal to take over Axa's UK life business.Oil services specialist Hunting said trading in the first half has been 'very positive' despite the BP oil spill and sluggish natural gas prices, though the group admitted that there will be some impact from the Gulf of Mexico disaster in the second half.Entertainment media retailer HMV announced results that were in line with market expectations, while sales burst through the £2bn level to hit a record level. More importantly for income investors who have taken advantage of the stock's 13% dividend yield, the full year dividend has been held at 7.4p.SDL, the information management solutions provider, has bought Dutch browser-based software developer Xopus. The initial consideration is €1.6m, with the company being bought on a debt free basis. The cost of the acquisition could rise to €2m, depending on the performance of Xopus in the year to 30 June 2011.House price figures from the Nationwide building society has had shareholders of housebuilders racing for the exits. Nationwide said house prices edged up by just 0.1% month-on-month in June. Redrow, Taylor Wimpey and Persimmon occupy the three bottom slots in the FTSE 250 table. At the opposite end of the FTSE 250 leaderboard sits acquisitive insurance firm Resolution on its return from suspension. The shares had been suspended pending the acquisition of the UK life and pensions operation of Axa.Big hits such as 'Avatar', 'Iron Man 2' and 'Sex and the City 2', helped cinema chain Cineworld overcome the competing attractions of the World Cup and lift revenue by 3.7% in the half year to June.Car and van renter Northgate has returned to profit after the huge write-downs that nearly sank the company last year, but ruled out a dividend in view of the economic uncertainty in both its main markets.