London pre-open: Stocks set for rebound

Stocks are set to rebound this morning against a backdrop of a hectic company results schedule. City traders expect the top share index to open around 24 points up from last night's close of 5,984.First quarter profits fell sharply at part-nationalised lender Lloyds Banking, as the bank took an impairment charge that was half a billion pounds larger than it was expecting, largely to reflect declining Irish property prices. The group saw profit before tax fall to £284m in the first quarter on a combined businesses basis from £1,104m the year before. Underlying income fell to £5.20bn from £5.97bn a year earlier and £5.75bn in the preceding quarter.Times have been tough in the 13 weeks to 1 May but Morrisons has been appealing to its customers' sense of patriotism, helping the supermarket to post growth ahead of the market, it said today. Total sales excluding fuel during the period were up by 4.2% from the same period a year ago, or by 2.5% on a like-for-like basis.Indian mining giant Vedanta produced record volumes of commodities as prices soared, helping it post a sharp rise in full-year profits. In the year to 31 March, EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) rose by 55% from the previous year to $3.6bn (£2.2bn), on revenues that climbed 44% to $11.4bn.Paper and packaging firm Mondi said price increases have been pushed through across all of its major product lines, contributing to the group's best quarterly performance for some time. Underlying profit in the first quarter of 2011 of €187m was well ahead of the figure for the corresponding period of 2010 and was also better than the results achieved in the final two quarters of 2010.---jh