London open: Blue chips ease lower

London has drifted lower in early dealing with attention switching to Bahrain and some mixed trading updates. Miner Anglo American is down even though it doubled profits in 2010 and is merging its UK cement, aggregates and ready-mixed concrete business with French giant Lafarge. Underlying earnings leapt to $4.98bn from $2.57bn in 2009 on revenue up 34% to $32.93bn. Profit before tax was up 171% to $10.93bn and underlying earnings per share of $4.13 was better than expected.Rentokil missed forecasts in 2010 as the cold weather in December added to the woes of its parcels delivery business City Link. Pre-tax profits tumbled from £60m to £15.3m after huge write-offs of £150.5m. The firm swung from profits of £26.8m to a loss of £55.7m in the last three months of year if all of the one-off charges of £110m are included. More people are leaving their cars at home and taking the bus, according to Keith Ludeman, the chief executive of public transport group Go-Ahead. "Whilst rail remains difficult to predict, we now expect our full year operating profit across our rail and bus businesses to be higher than we previously anticipated and around the same as achieved last year (FY'10: £101.0m)." Ludeman said.Industrial engineer Charter improved during 2010, but weakness in Europe, where the company makes most of its money, held the business back. Profit before tax jumped 55% to £144.1m last year and by 18% to £148.2m before exceptional items. Revenue was up 3.6% at £1.72bn.Anite has traded better than expected in the past three months with growing 4G demand lifting orders at its handsets and networks businesses to record levels and offsetting a flat travel side. Sales have been slower than expected at mobile antenna maker Sarantel in the first five months of its financial year due to internal technical problems at two of its big customers. The firm, which raised £1.25m in December, said it is confident that once the clients have resolved the issues, their orders will return in the second half of the financial year. Anglo American Rentokil Initial Ashoka India Equity Investment Trust Plc