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UK stocks gained substantially on Tuesday, boosted by a jump in oil prices inspired by hopes of rising demand for energy as countries tentatively emerge from coronavirus lockdowns.
The rally came despite more bad economic news, this time showing that the UK's dominant services sector effectively stalled in April. The services Purchasing Managers' Index for April showed a record low reading of just 13.4, down from 34.5 in March.
At 1159, the benchmark FTSE 100 index was up 1.25%, or 71.98 points, to 5,825.76.
LARGE AND MID CAP RISERS AND FALLERS
Oil and gas giants BP and Royal Dutch Shell jumped 4.56% to 314.3p and 3.73% to £12.67 respectively.
Cairn Energy gained 4.84% to 118.9p, despite a well offshore Mexico in which it held a 30% stake coming up dry.
Elsewhere, cruise operator Carnival rose 3% to 993p after it confirmed news first issued on Monday that it planned to commence eight services from US ports from 1 August and elsewhere from 31 August.
Budget airline Ryanair ascended 0.7% to €9.28, even as it revealed it had carried 99.6% less passengers in April.
Rival carrier Wizz Air dipped 1% to £25.83, having carried 97.6% less passengers over the same month.
Refractory product supplier RHI Magnesita gained 3.67% to £24.28, even as it said it faced an increasingly challenging trading environment in the second quarter as the coronavirus crisis crimps orders.
Real estate investor LondonMetric Property rose 2.35% to 187p after it said it would pay a final dividend for its 2020 financial year and planned to raise £100m from a share issue to spend on acquisitions.
The issue price would be being determined via a bookbuild process. LondonMetric also reported a rise in annual earnings and said 92% of rental payments due by 1 April had been collected or were being collected monthly.
SMALL CAP RISERS AND FALLERS
Housing services group Mears increased 4.1% to 170.2p as it forecast 'modest' operating losses during the UK's coronavirus lockdown period.
Office and industrial property investor Regional REIT firmed 5.8% to 78.8p after it secured high levels of rent collection during the coronavirus crisis.
Subsea cable protection group Tekmar rallied 6% to 121.9p as it forecast a 40% rise in revenue for the financial year just completed, and said current demand in the offshore wind sector remained strong.
Mobile games developer Gaming Realms jumped 4.4% to 9.6p on announcing that it had extended a licensing and revenue share agreement with 888 Holdings.
Technology and media company Entertainment AI soared 11.6% to 28.5p after it reported first-quarter revenues down 8% at $2.1m and an adjusted pre-tax loss of $630,000. The firm had $7.9m of net cash at 30 April 2020.
Software-as-a-service gambling company GAN suspended trading in its shares today after successfully raising funds and listing its shares on the US technology NASDAQ market, with the shares due to start trading at 10am Eastern US time, equivalent to 3pm UK time.