LONDON: U.K. stocks snapped three days of gains, as slumping shares of Anglo American Plc and Wm Morrison Supermarkets Plc weighed on the FTSE 100 Index before the Bank of England meets today.
BOE officials are seen keeping the key interest rate at 0.5 percent, and economists and investors are at odds about when a rate rise will come, seeing February as the earliest opportunity.
Morrison fell 3.3 percent after reporting a fifteenth-straight drop in quarterly sales. Anglo American dropped 4.4 percent. AstraZeneca Plc rallied 3 percent after raising its profit and sales forecast for the year.
The FTSE 100 fell 0.7 percent at 9:21 a.m. in London. U.K.’s benchmark gauge has risen this week, shored up by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen’s comments that a December rate hike is a possibility if economic data continued to point to growth and firmer consumer prices. Last month, the benchmark posted its biggest monthly rally since 2013.
The broader FTSE All-Share Index lost 0.4 percent today, while Ireland’s ISEQ Index fell 0.6 percent.
