FTSE 100 Index Gains 9% in 2010; Weir, Arm Holdings, Fresnillo Soar

Arthi Gupta
31 Dec, 2010
New York City

The UK indexes dropped after home prices rose in December and for the year FTSE 100 index gained 9%.India-based Sahara Group bought Grosvenor House Hotel for

[R]1:00 PM London – The UK indexes dropped after home prices rose in December and for the year FTSE 100 index gained 9%.India-based Sahara Group bought Grosvenor House Hotel for £470 million. UK subsidiary of Dollar Financial completed the acquisition of Sefina Finance AB.[/R]

In London, FTSE 100 Index declined 71.07 or 1.19% to 5,899.94 and the pound edged higher to close at $1.5524. For the week, the FTSE 100 index gained 0.48% and for the year increased 9%.

Weir Group led the FTSE 100 index gainers with a surge of 147% followed by Arm Holdings with a rise of 141%. Fresnillo gained 111%, Antofagasta soared 62% and BHP Billiton added 28%.

BP Plc dropped 22% and Resolution Group fell 32% in 2010.

European markets showed a mixed performance in 2010 as Germany led the region with a rise of 16%.

CAC 40 index in Paris fell 3.4%. The IBEX 35 index in Madrid declined 17% and FTSE MIB index in Milan dropped 13%. Dollar weighted RTS index in Moscow rose 22% and Turkey benchmark index gained 25%.

The Athens based ASE index dropped 35% and led the region’s decliners.

UK Home Prices Flat

British home prices increased in December for the first time in seven months, figures from the Nationwide Building Society showed on Friday.

The building society’s latest house price survey indicates that the average price of a property rose 0.4% in December to £162,763, after sliding 0.3% in November.

In the fourth quarter, house prices slipped in ten out of 13 regions, with North Ireland recording the biggest fall.

British Prime Minister David Cameron in his New Year message on Friday said the year 2011 is going to be difficult as the government takes hard but necessary steps to sort things out.

He said, ""The deficit we inherited back in May was actually forecast to be bigger than that of Ireland or Greece - or any other developed country for that matter.""

""But we have pulled Britain out of that danger zone,"" Cameron said.

Sahara Group Buys Grosvenor House Hotel

Sahara India Pariwar, one of India''s largest conglomerates that own assets ranging from TV channels to real estate bought London''s iconic Grosvenor House hotel from the Royal Bank of Scotland for £470 million or $728 million.

Grosvenor House, located in London''s Mayfair district, has 420 rooms, 74 suites and 27 conference rooms, overlooking Hyde Park.

Dollar Financial Acquires Sefina Finance AB

Dollar Financial Corp., the diversified financial services company said that its wholly owned UK subsidiary, Dollar Financial U.K. Ltd., completed the acquisition of Sweden-headquartered pawn lending business Sefina Finance AB.

The total cash consideration for the transaction is approximately $73 million, of which $58 million was cash paid at closing with the remaining approximately $15 million of additional cash to be paid in installments during calendar year 2011.

Gainers & Losers

Acta S.p.A. fell 1.27% to 58.50 pence after the provider of clean energy products and environmental catalysts completed the conditional sale of four photovoltaic authorizations, with a contract value of €0.9 million, to SPF Energy S.p.A.

Lonmin plc dropped 0.66% to1,966 pence after the platinum producer said Alan Ferguson resigned as a director of the company. In addition, Mahomed Seedat joins the board as a non-executive director on January 1.

Tricor PLC surged 22.58% to 0.190 pence after the company engaged in the export and import of mobile phones and other electrical equipment said it raised £2.55 million by way of an offering of £2.55 million Zero Coupon Convertible Unsecured Loan Notes 2012.

ViaLogy plc slumped 3.43% to 3.38 pence after the signal processing solutions provider reported first-half revenues surged 406% to £57,031 from £11,266 in the same period last year. Loss for the period widened 22% to £3.11 million or 0.449 pence per share, compared to a loss of £2.55 million or 0.425 pence per share in the prior year.