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UK stocks fell on Tuesday after fears of a resurgence of coronavirus cases were reinforced by new lockdown measures, including in Leicester.
At 1200, the benchmark FTSE 100 index was down 33.57 points, or 0.54%, at 6,192.20.
LARGE AND MID CAP RISERS AND FALLERS
Oil and gas giant Royal Dutch Shell slipped 2.08% to £12.44 after it warned that it would book a massive net impairment charge in the second quarter of up to $22bn after it cut its oil-price forecasts in the wake of the coronavirus crisis.
Hotel chain InterContinental Hotels fell 1.04% to £36.08, having forecast its second-quarter room revenue to tumble 75%, though it also said it had seen signs of improvements as the pace of hotels reopening continued to accelerate.
Cinema group Cineworld jumped 4.08% to 59.66p despite nudging back plans to reopen cinemas in the UK and US to the end of July, citing recent adjustments to the schedule of upcoming movie releases.
Gold miner Petropavlovsk slumped 12.24% to 27.21p after its board of directors was voted out by new major shareholder UGC.
Chief executive Pavel Maslovskiy and chairman Sir Roderic Lyne are set to be ousted, with co-founder Peter Hambro set to return to the business as interim chairman.
Engineering company Smiths rose 7.55% to £13.96 as it announced that it would cut an as-yet-unspecified number of jobs as part of a restructuring process, even as it announced a rise in year-to-date revenue.
Further details of the restructuring, designed to save around £70m a year, would be provided at Smiths' full-year results on 24 September.
House builder Redrow slumped 4.71% to 440.6p after its annual sales slumped 36% and its profit fell substantially thanks to Covid-19 lockdowns.
Flow control and instrumentation group Rotork reversed 2.1% to 279.8p, having forecast first-half revenue to slip by around 11-13%, assuming there were no additional Covid-19-related disruptions.
Adjusted operating profits would be lower, Rotork said, though it added that margins would be 'relatively resilient'.
Infrastructure group Balfour Beatty gained 1.55% to 262p after joint venture Gammon Construction was awarded a HK$5.67bn (£596m) contract from the Hong Kong government to deliver buildings, mechanical and electrical works.
Solar power investor NextEnergy Solar Fund dipped 0.74% to 107.2p after it bumped up its dividend by 3.3%, even as it swung to a full-year loss due to lower power prices and a fall in the value of its investments.
NextEnergy Solar Fund declared a dividend for the year through March of 6.87p per share, up from 6.65p on-year.
Online travel agent On The Beach softened 0.75% to 299.74p after it swung to a first half loss after the crisis hammered international tourism markets and announced that finance director Paul Meehan has resigned to pursue other interests.
On current trading, the company said there had been a significant increase in bookings from mid-June, albeit from a very low base.
SMALL CAP RISERS AND FALLERS
Advertising firm M&C Saatchi rallied 6.53% to 52.2p on revealing that the coronavirus crisis hadn't hurt its business in April and May as severely as it had first expected.
Telematics technology company Trakm8 surged 21.54% to 15.8p as it reported a modest return to sales growth and narrowed losses for the year to March 2020 and announced new contract wins with two new significant insurance companies.