On International Women’s Day, the number of women leading Britain’s 100 biggest companies fell from an already paltry five to four.
Alliance Trust, the fund manager run by Katherine Garrett-Cox, lost its place in the top flight in the latest reshuffle of London’s leading companies.
The remaining quartet comprises Dame Marjorie Scardino at the publisher Pearson, Angela Ahrendts at the Burberry fashion house, Imperial Tobacco’s Alison Cooper and Cynthia Carroll at the miner Anglo American.
Nicknamed Katherine the Great, Ms Garrett-Cox has run the Scottish investment trust since 2008. Although its share price has risen by more than 16 per cent to 359p in that time, comfortably outpacing the Footsie’s sub10 per cent, the 123-year-old trust still trades at a hefty discount to assets.
That prompted Laxey Partners. the activist investor and the hedge fund, to write to Alliance last month demanding action to narrow that discount.
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Based on last night’s closing prices, African Barrick Gold — down 20½p at 547½p — was relegated from the Footsie alongside Alliance, which ended the day unchanged at 349p.
Out, too, is Bunzl, a day after the plastic bag maker made Eugenia Ulasewicz the first female director in its 150-year history. The packaging and distribution group’s shares fell 7p to 724p.
Subject to confirmation by FTSE, the company behind the indices, they will be replaced before trading starts on Monday 21st by ITV and the oil services group John Wood. ITV shares fell 1½ to 90p and Wood Group rose 4½ to 666½p. The paper and packaging group Mondi is also a candidate. Its shares rose 2½ to 571p.
Overall, the stock market flatlined as investors were a touch relieved by an easing oil price but remained wary of the turmoil in the Middle East. The FTSE 100 edged a point higher to 5,974.8 in lacklustre trading.
There was healthy demand for insurers in the eye of the industry’s reporting season. Aviva, with strong results last week, rose 5¼p to 475p. Old Mutual, 4½p higher at 137¾p, reassured yesterday. Prudential was chased 13½p higher to 714p and Standard Life 1½p to 240p. Both report today, with the former tipped to declare Asia to be still booming and the latter to have taken fresh steps towards a transformation from stodgy life and pensions company to a slicker, faster wealth manager.
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Morgan Stanley lit a fire under telecoms shares by touting their defensive investment credentials in tougher times. The push lifted BT 7¼p to 191p and Vodafone 3¼p to 181¾p.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch urged clients to buy Cairn Energy shares, which responded with a rise of 6¾p to 448p. Merrill suggested that the oil explorer may well get the nod from India to sell its assets there to the miner Vedanta Resources, off 39p at £23.26.
Mining shares were unsettled for a third day by weakened prices of copper and other metals caused by concerns that the oil price may see economic recovery lurch. That, and the violence in Ivory Coast, where it has mining operations, sent Randgold Resources 400p lower to £44.80.
Still in Africa, investors were also looking to Uganda, from where there was an unconfirmed report that Tullow Oil had resolved finally its tax wrangle with Kampala. Belatedly, that would clear the way for Tullow’s proposed partnership there with France’s Total and CNOOC, of China. The dispute centres on the amount of tax that should be paid on Tullow’s £973 million purchase of Heritage Oil’s Ugandan assets last year.
Though Tullow eased 33p to £14.60 ahead of results today — and in step with an oil price softened by anticipation that Opec will increase production to offset that lost from Libya — Heritage was chased higher amid speculation of an possible takeover. Austria’s OMV and DNO International, the Norwegian explorer with assets near Heritage’s sites in the Kurdish region of Iraq, were mentioned. BG, one of the other names on traders’ lips, poured cold water on an idea that it may want Heritage’s Iraqi assets. Changing hands for 304p at best, Heritage shares eventually settled a more modest 7½p higher at 282p.
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Kalahari Minerals closed at 301p, a significant premium to the 290p a share that China’s state-owned nuclear power company indicated on Monday that it might be prepared to pay. Traders were betting that Rio Tinto, owner of 11.5 per cent of the Namibian uranium miner, may step in and up the ante.
Neither would talk of private equity moving for Micro Focus International completely lie down, although the IT company dipped ½p to 314¾p.
Vane Minerals was 10.3 per cent better at 3.72p after lifting the estimate of the amount of uranium in its asset in Arizona by 26 per cent.
Arena Leisure rose 1¼p to 32p after it emerged that it was in the running to provide the food at a Championship football club.