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Stocks in London were trading lower Monday, amid concerns over rapidly spreading COVID cases and the potential for further lockdowns in the U.K.
The FTSE 100 index
UKX,
fell 1.1% to 7,188.19, with the pound
GBPUSD,
slipped 0.2% against the dollar. The U.K. stock index, with its heavily weighted energy stocks BP
BP,
BP,
and Royal Dutch Shell
RDSA,
RDS.B,
was weighed by a 5% loss for oil, which drove those names 5% and 3% lower, respectively.
“With the vaccine maker Pfizer estimating that the pandemic will last until 2024, uncertainty about the year ahead is rippling through the markets. Countries are bracing for waves of infection to hit, watching the new variant rip through communities in South Africa and the United Kingdom,” said Susannah Streeter, senior investment and markets analyst, at Hargreaves Lansdown, in a client note.
The Netherlands has locked down its population until mid-January, and U.K. officials wouldn’t rule out tighter restrictions before Christmas, with cases hitting records, and 82,886 more confirmed on Sunday. The British Medical Association has warned that almost 50,000 doctors, nurses and other National Health Service staff in England could be off sick by Christmas, barring further measures.
Read: U.K. nurses see ‘very bleak’ next few weeks because of omicron
Stock in movie-theatre Cineworld
CINE,
slumped more than 6%.
Pharmaceutical groups were also among the losers amid worries over economic expansion, which delivered a blow to miners such as Rio Tinto
RIO,
RIO,
which was down more than 3%, and Antofagasta
ANTO,
which was trading more than 6%, at last check.
