Sector movers: Telecoms in demand

Mobile Telecommunications has had a good reception Thursday, with heavyweight Vodafone, ably supported by Inmarsat and minnow Mobile Streams.Big gun AstraZeneca is dragging down Pharmaceuticals & Biotechnology. Earlier today it reported a bigger than expected 4% drop in third quarter sales to $7.9bn. Core earnings per share fell 10% to $1.50.Panmure Gordon thinks gross margin will be seen as the biggest concern, as it fell by 3.9 percentage points from a year earlier to 80.7%, but its still rates the shares a 'buy'.Top performing sectors so far todayAlternative Energy 2,925.99 +6.02%Mobile Telecommunications 3,918.41 +2.91%Technology Hardware & Equipment 574.00 +2.14%Industrial Metals & Mining 7,479.70 +1.80%Aerospace and Defence 3,405.65 +1.38%Bottom performing sectors so far todayPharmaceuticals & Biotechnology 8,980.33 -1.65%Automobiles & Parts 4,098.63 -1.52%Industrial Engineering 6,080.37 -0.99%Chemicals 6,456.45 -0.71%Forestry & Paper 5,611.88 -0.67%