FTSE falls ahead of GDP figures

The FTSE 100 was down 1% this morning with no companies showing gains and confounding forecasts that the index would sit tight until UK GDP figures are released at 9.30am.

The fall was blamed on increasing concern over the economic health of Ireland and Portugal. In the US all the major markets, the Dow Jones, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq, closed down last night with investor confidence hit by Moody’s credit rating cut to Ireland’s debt. The Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development urged Portugal to extend its public sector pay freeze and raise taxes.

The FTSE 100 was down 1%, a fall of 55 points to 5518 adding to a 0.5% fall yesterday.

The UK’s second quarter GDP is expected to stay at 1.2% quarterly growth, and 1.7% annualised growth figures when the numbers are released. Later this afternoon US consumer confidence data is also expected.

The FTSE 100 fall included a general downward movement for miners with five of them amongst the FTSE’s biggest losers. The movement , which came after a positive day for the sector yesterday, appeared to be amplified by a raft of price changes by analysts at Deutsche Bank.

The FTSE’s biggest faller was Vedanta Resources which was the only miner to get a full blown downgrade to ‘hold’ from ‘buy’.  Its shares were down 2% at £22.47.

Otherwise the bank raised target prices on Xstrata, Lonmin, Kazakhmys, Fresnillo, Ferrexpo, Aquarius Platinum, Antofagasta and African Barrick. It cut price targets on Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton and Anglo American,

Hedge fund manager Man Group was also down nearly 2% after reporting that clients were pulling out of its funds for the eighth consecutive quarter with net outflows of $600 million over three months to September leaving £39.5 billion assets under management.

There were no gainers but Sage Group, down 0.15% at 266p and Next down 0.09% at £21.98, were the two companies down the least.