FTSE 100 Retreats After Positive Start, Down Marginally

(RTTNews) - The U.K. market is down slightly a little past noon on Monday, having shed early gains, as investors await a slew of corporate earnings announcements due this week.

Reports about the EU and U.S. arriving at a trade deal lifted sentiment in European markets this morning, but most of the major markets are off early highs with the focus shifting to earnings and economic data.

AstraZeneca, Barclays, HSBC Holdings, GSK, Shell, Unilever, Standard Chartered, Haleon and Anglo American Plc are among the big names scheduled to report their earnings this week.

The benchmark FTSE 100 was down 11.65 points or 0.12% at 9,108.59 about half an hour past noon. The index had advanced to 9,171.90 earlier in the session.

Intertek Group, Beazley, GSK, Barclays, ICG, RightMove, The Sage Group and Segro are gainng 0.8 to 1.4%.

Among the losers, BT Group is down more than 3%. Marks & Spencer is down 2.1%, while Centrica, Vodafone Group, Glencore, Babcock International, Kingfisher, Taylor Wimpey, Sainsbury (J), BAE Systems, Rio Tinto and Coca-Cola HBC are down 1 to 1.7%.

Tesco is down more than 1%. The groceries and general merchandise retailer announced today that it has launched the second tranche of its 1.45 billion pounds share buyback programme, committing up to 500 million pounds for additional repurchases.

The move follows the completion of the first tranche on July 25, during which the company bought back 182,303,915 shares for a total market value of approximately 700 million pounds.