London open: Stocks drop as Greece given more time

Concerns about Greece continued to weigh on sentiment on Tuesday morning, causing the FTSE 100 index to fall sharply in early trading.Meanwhile, there was news that China is "actively studying" the expansion of the property tax programme on concerns that transaction volumes and home prices could increase "substantially", according to the Minister of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, Jiang Weixin.Eurozone finance ministers announced that they would grant Greece a two-year extension to get its fiscal house in order, but stopped short of giving the go-ahead on the €31.5bn tranche. Eurogroup Chairman Jean-Claude Juncker boldly stated that Athens's deadline to bring debt down to 120% of gross domestic product by 2020 would be extended to 2022. "Although EU finance ministers agreed to give Greece two additional years until budget and deficit targets have to be met, there has no progress been made what the main sticking point is concerned which is how to raise the extra funds needed resulting from giving Greece more time," said Markus Huber, the head of German HNW trading at ETX Capital.However International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Christine Lagarde openly showed her disapproval and said that the two organisations obviously had "different views" on the timetable that the Hellenic Republic needs to complete. A number of economic indicators across Europe are scheduled for release later this morning: the UK consumer price index; the UK retail price index; and the German ZEW index, which is expected to increase from -11.5 to -10.0 in November. Meanwhile, Italy is expected to sell €6.5bn of short-term debt today."Overall sentiment is clearly negative today, there is  also plenty of uncertainty remaining regarding the US and the 'Fiscal Cliff' too and it shouldn't be much of a surprise if last week's lows would be put to test early on," Huber said.FTSE 100: ITV jumps after half-year reportNet advertising revenue (NAR) at ITV fell in the third quarter, but not as much as the rest of the market, the broadcaster said. The company took a hit from the Olympics and Paralympics, which were shown on the BBC. Shares surged by over 5% in the opening hour.Telecoms giant Vodafone fell after plunging into the red after being hit by a huge £5.9bn impairment charge during the half year ended September 30th, related to its operations in Spain and Italy.Continuing delays on Anglo American's Minas-Rio iron ore project in Brazil are likely to push up the cost of the project more than the market had been expecting, causing shares to tank early on.Building materials giant CRH rose despite scaling back its earnings forecast this year on the back of ongoing weakness in Europe and Hurricane Sandy disrupting its operations in eastern America. Outsourcing giant Capita gained after saying it is confident it will deliver 3% organic growth for the year and an improved cash conversion rate for 2012 as compared to 2011.FTSE 250: De La Rue drops as paper volumes fallBank note printer De La Rue fell sharply after saying that while banknote print volumes were up 4.0% to 2.9bn notes in the six months ended September 29th, banknote paper volumes declined 15% to 4,500 tonnes. Salamander Energy tanked after announcing it has abandoned a well off the coast of Thailand after concluding it wasn't good enough to be commercialised. House builder Persimmon fell after saying that the UK housing market continues to be challenging and mortgage availability remains the key constraint; however it is still confident about future growth.Afren, the energy firm focused on Africa and the Middle East, has seen revenue smash through the billion dollar in the first nine months of the year, but shares fell.Petra Diamonds rose after reporting a 188% increase in first-quarter revenue and saying that lost production due to "challenging labour relations" in the South African mining industry will to some extent be made up during the coming months.Nickel miner Talvivaara continues to be hit by concerns about its operations in Finland which have been affect by an "unfortunate gypsum pond leakage" that started last week.FTSE 100 - RisersITV (ITV) 91.85p +5.82%Standard Chartered (STAN) 1,452.50p +0.62%Diageo (DGE) 1,810.00p +0.56%Reckitt Benckiser Group (RB.) 3,798.00p +0.56%Bunzl (BNZL) 1,020.00p +0.49%CRH (CRH) 1,140.00p +0.44%Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) 778.00p +0.32%Associated British Foods (ABF) 1,389.00p +0.29%Capita (CPI) 729.00p +0.28%Sage Group (SGE) 305.10p +0.16%FTSE 100 - FallersAnglo American (AAL) 1,759.00p -3.75%Eurasian Natural Resources Corp. (ENRC) 278.70p -3.60%Vodafone Group (VOD) 161.00p -3.36%Centrica (CNA) 311.20p -2.63%Kazakhmys (KAZ) 662.00p -2.58%SSE (SSE) 1,364.00p -2.22%Evraz (EVR) 231.30p -2.20%Rio Tinto (RIO) 3,017.00p -2.08%Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,081.00p -1.99%Polymetal International (POLY) 1,127.00p -1.91%FTSE 250 - RisersTalkTalk Telecom Group (TALK) 195.90p +4.98%Hansteen Holdings (HSTN) 79.15p +4.97%Diploma (DPLM) 449.30p +3.26%Oxford Instruments (OXIG) 1,291.00p +2.62%Petra Diamonds Ltd.(DI) (PDL) 101.90p +2.57%Centamin (DI) (CEY) 72.50p +2.11%Menzies(John) (MNZS) 590.00p +1.99%JD Sports Fashion (JD.) 745.00p +1.29%Perform Group (PER) 401.60p +1.24%Telecom Plus (TEP) 855.00p +1.18%FTSE 250 - FallersTalvivaara Mining Company (TALV) 89.00p -7.05%De La Rue (DLAR) 993.00p -6.67%New World Resources A Shares (NWR) 246.60p -4.34%Salamander Energy (SMDR) 184.80p -3.75%Ferrexpo (FXPO) 200.50p -2.76%Afren (AFR) 136.00p -2.58%Hochschild Mining (HOC) 470.10p -2.47%ITE Group (ITE) 189.20p -2.47%Mondi (MNDI) 640.00p -2.36%Lonmin (LMI) 473.60p -1.99%BC