Footsie stays in red despite small rebound

Markets faced another nightmare day yesterday, with London’s top index losing more than 4 per cent of its value at one point.

The FTSE 100 closed down 246.07 points at 6,796.4, a 3.5 per cent drop – but a rebound from the 6,731.35 seen about an hour before the close. But it was only the second-worst day this week for the index, after Monday when it lost 247.09 points. It means that £152 billion has been wiped off the index over the four days amid fears over Covid-19.

Sterling lost 0.2 per cent of its value against the dollar, with one pound now buying $1.2873. It fell by 1.02 per cent to €1.1732 against the euro.

Advertising giant WPP said its most-watched measure of revenue, which removes passthrough costs, fell 0.3 per cent to £10.8bn in 2019. Shares plummeted 146.8p, to 761.6p.

Topps Tiles dropped nearly 25 per cent to 59p after warning over profits as Britons rein in their spending on DIY. And Corona beer maker AB Inbev revealed a hit from the coronavirus outbreak, and warned over the steepest decline in quarterly profit for at least a decade, causing shares to drop 10.5 per cent to 55.55p.

Paddy Power and Betfair owner Flutter saw pretax profits tumble as it was hit by higher UK gambling taxes. Shares plunged 600p to 8,226p.

UK housebuilder Persimmon fell by 195p to 2,883p as its chief executive David Jenkinson stepped down after just over a year in the role.

NMC Health’s shares were suspended after it sacked its chief executive, suspended a member of its treasury team and gave “extended leave” to its finance chief having found discrepancies in its bank statements.