London shares closed lower on Monday as mining stocks dropped amid anxiety about growth in China, the world’s second largest economy, dealers said.
The benchmark FTSE-100 index ended the day 11.54 points or 0.18 percent down at 6,400.45.
“The FTSE continues to drag, weighed down by mining stocks after weekend Chinese data came in below forecasts signalling weak demand in raw materials,” said Lee Mumford, a sales trader at Spreadex.
On Saturday, Beijing reported a sharp slowdown in exports in May from April, while imports unexpectedly dropped owing to weakness in the domestic economy and sluggish demand overseas.
Official data meanwhile showed Chinese industrial production, which measures output at the country’s factories and mines, rose at a slower pace than during the previous month while fixed asset investment also came in below expectations.
Among London-listed mining stocks Polymetal shed the most, plunging 4.66 percent to 644 pence. Anglo American lost 2.84 percent to 1,431.50 pence, Rio Tinto fell 2.42 percent to 2,740 pence and Vedanta eased 2.34 percent to 1,212 pence.
Severn Trent was the biggest FTSE faller overall, sinking 5.99 percent to 1,946 pence after the water supplier rejected the latest takeover attempt by a consortium including Canadian and Kuwaiti investment companies, which in turn said it would make no further offers.
“The board, having consulted its financial advisers, has unanimously concluded that the proposal continues to fail to reflect the significant long term value of Severn Trent or to recognise its future potential,” the group said in a statement.
Severn Trent had already rejected two previous offers from the consortium.
On Friday, the consortium lodged its third takeover bid at 2,200 pence per share, but the £5.3-billion offer assumed that a final dividend for the year ending in March 2013 had not been paid by Severn Trent to its shareholders.
Broadcaster ITV spearheaded the gainers, climbing 3.71 percent to 134.20 pence, while budget airline EasyJet added 2.68 percent to 1,226 pence.
This week’s highlight on the corporate news front is likely to be Sainsbury’s first quarter trading update on Wednesday, coming on the heels of rival supermarket chain Tesco’s revelation last week that like-for-like sales dropped 1 percent in the UK.
On the currency markets, sterling edged up to $1.5560 at 5:15 pm from $1.5550 on Friday evening and was steady at 1.1761 euros versus 1.1759 euros before the weekend.
London shares drop as miners fall on growth fears
