The FTSE 100 (FTSEINDICES: ^FTSE) is slowly picking itself out of the ruins of the past few days, with a 20-point rise by late morning to 6,592 coming on top of a minor recovery of 22 points yesterday. But with the index as high as 6,867 points last Tuesday, we’ve still seen a fall of 275 points in just over a week.
Which shares are depressing the FTSE indices? Here are three today:
Mulberry
A profit warning from Mulberry Group this morning sent the fashion retailer’s shares crashing by 241p (26.7%) to 659p.
The producer of luxury leather goods said that pre-tax profit for the year to March 2014 will now be “substantially below current market expectations“, putting the blame on “significant” wholesale cancellations from Korea and on deteriorating trading conditions in the UK.
Mulberry shares were approximately 20% down over 12 months before today’s news, and they’d now down 40%.
HSBC Holdings
Shares in HSBC Holdings (LSE: HSBA) (NYSE: HSBC.US) fell back a little this morning with a 2.6p (0.4%) drop to 631p, though the only real news today was results from HSBC Bank Oman for the year ended 31 December 2013 — and they looked decent, with net interest income up 20% and other operating income up 0.5%.
The real reason behind HSBC’s recent mini-slide is surely China, with fears of overheating credit and property prices putting the frighteners on investors in companies doing substantial business in the Asian region — HSBC generated around a third of its 2012 profits in Hong Kong.
BTG
Our third laggard today, BTG (LSE: BTG), fell 14.5p (2.4%) to 591p, even though an interim management statement today told us that things are going in line with expectations.
The specialist healthcare company reiterated its guidance for full-year revenue of £275-285m, with chief executive Louise Makin telling us the firm “has made strong progress in 2013” and predicting “sustainable and profitable long-term growth“.
Today’s minor blip is nothing for shareholders to worry about — their shares have gained more than 85% over the past 12 months, while the FTSE 100 is up less than 5% after recent falls.
