FTSE 100 movers: BT gains as it sells iconic London tower; HSBC tumbles

(Sharecast News) - London's FTSE 100 was down 0.7% at 7,663.29 in afternoon trade on Wednesday. BT Group was among the gainers after saying it had agreed to sell the BT Tower to MCR Hotels for £275m.

MCR plans to preserve the BT Tower "as an iconic hotel, securing its place as a London landmark for the future," it said.

On the downside, HSBC tumbled as it posted a record jump in annual profits and announced a $2bn share buyback but missed forecasts as it was forced to take a $3bn hit from its exposure to a Chinese bank.

The Asia-focused lender said full-year pre-tax profit rose 78% to $30.3bn driven by high global interest rates, but below the $34.1bn average estimate of brokers compiled by the bank.

Danni Hewson, head of financial analysis at AJ Bell, said: "The company has been stung by a $3 billion charge on its stake in a Chinese bank and write-downs associated with commercial real estate and the sale of its French business. That's made the results a bit of a mess and led to a miss on full year forecasts.

"The outlook is also a bit of fudge with the company expecting to hit previously guided returns in the mid-teens for 2024, but only once some one-offs are stripped out. Costs are moving higher and loan losses are also going in the wrong direction from the bank's perspective.

"Amid all the noise, news of a $2 billion share buyback has been lost which feels a little unfair given the company will have returned upwards of 10% of its market valuation in dividends and buybacks in respect of 2023."

Rio Tinto was in the red as it said that commodity price movements led to a $1.5bn hit to underlying profits in 2023, though results were partly offset by a stronger US dollar and lower energy prices.

Glencore lost ground as it reported a halving of its full-year adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation amid lower commodity prices.

FTSE 100 - Risers

Convatec Group (CTEC) 247.20p 2.06% BT Group (BT.A) 108.55p 1.59% B&M European Value Retail S.A. (DI) (BME) 525.00p 1.47% International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (CDI) (IAG) 149.85p 1.46% Beazley (BEZ) 580.50p 1.22% Frasers Group (FRAS) 840.50p 1.14% St James's Place (STJ) 661.20p 1.13% Halma (HLMA) 2,306.00p 1.05% InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) 8,410.00p 0.91% CRH (CDI) (CRH) 6,192.00p 0.85%

FTSE 100 - Fallers

HSBC Holdings (HSBA) 585.40p -9.07% Centrica (CNA) 130.35p -2.29% Croda International (CRDA) 4,892.00p -2.14% Entain (ENT) 904.40p -2.02% Ocado Group (OCDO) 521.40p -1.96% Flutter Entertainment (DI) (FLTR) 16,330.00p -1.57% WPP (WPP) 777.00p -1.42% Rio Tinto (RIO) 5,161.00p -1.32% Glencore (GLEN) 385.45p -1.27% Smith (DS) (SMDS) 320.10p -1.26%