FTSE 100 Up Nearly 0.5% At Noon; Miners Slip As Metal Prices Tumble

The UK stock market’s benchmark index FTSE 100 recovered after a weak start Friday morning with gains in financials and consumer sectors offsetting weakness in mining and energy stocks.

A sell-off in precious metals and oil triggered selling mining and energy stocks this morning. Gold and silver prices tanked 4% and 11%, respectively, while Copper fell 2.2%. Oil futures slid 1.1%.

Reports about U.S. lawmakers reaching a bipartisan funding deal to avoid a government shutdown aided sentiment to some extent.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump is reportedly set to announce former Federal Reserve official Kevin Warsh as his choice to replace Jerome Powell as the chair of the central bank.

The FTSE 100 was up 45.84 points or 0.45% at 10,217.60 a little before noon.

Lloyds Banking Group advanced 2.3% as it launched a share buyback program to repurchase up to £1.75 billion of its ordinary shares.

Barclasy, Natwest Group and Standard Chartered moved up 1.5%-2.2%, while HSBC Holdings gained nearly 1%.

Experian gained about 3.6%. Smith & Nephew and Diageo climbed 2.5% and 2.4%, respectively.

IAG, Pearson, Reckitt Benckiser, Compass Group, Sainsbury (J), Easyjet, The Sage Group, JD Sports Fashion, Autotrader Group, Scottish Mortgage, Marks & Spencer and Roll-Royce Holdings gained 0.8 to 2%.

Fresnillo, Endeavour Mining and Antofagasta lost 3.2%-4%. Anglo American Plc slid 2.3% and Glencore shed about 1.7%, while Rio Tinto drifted lower by 1.6%.

Shell and BP shed about 0.3% and 0.7%, respectively.

Airtel Africa lost more than 8%. Mondi shed 3.1%. Metlen Energy & Metals, Whitbread, 3i Group, Rentokil Initial and Burberry Group lost 1%-2%.

A report from the Bank of England showed net mortgage approvals for house purchase in UK fell by 3,100 to 61,013 in December. This was the lowest since June 2024.

Consumer credit fell to GBP 1.5 billion in December from GBP 2.1 billion in November. Nonetheless, the annual growth in consumer credit remained unchanged at 8.2%.

Further, UK businesses borrowed a GBP 1.0 billion from banks and building societies, following net borrowing of GBP 6.2 billion in November, data showed.