FirstGroup swings to full-year loss, Segro collects 93pc of third quarter rent

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The FTSE 100 is expected to open 67 points lower on Wednesday, having closed down 1.53% at 6,189.90 on Tuesday.

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Segro said it had collected 93% of £37m in UK rent due for the third quarter after deferring payments on £9m. The company has received 98% of £88m rent due for the second quarter in the UK and continental Europe after adjusting for £13m that was rearranged.

AstraZeneca announced on Wednesday, alongside its partner MSD, that ‘Lynparza’, or olaparib, has been approved in the European Union for patients with germline BRCA-mutated metastatic pancreatic cancer. The FTSE 100 pharmaceuticals giant said the approval was based on results from the phase 3 ‘POLO’ trial, as published in the New England Journal of Medicine. It followed the recommendation for approval by the European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use.

Bus and rail operator FirstGroup pulled guidance and swung to a full-year loss as coronavirus lockdowns in the UK and US hit operations. The company on Wednesday reported an operating loss of £152.7m compared with a £9.8m profit a year ago. “There are material uncertainties as to how rapidly demand will increase, the rate at which fiscal support tapers and the duration of social distancing rules, as well as the timing of North American schools reopening. Therefore it is currently not possible to provide guidance for the financial year to 31 March 2021,” the company said.

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Next, Asos and Amazon have decided to pull all Boohoo clothing from sale as growing anger over workers’ pay and conditions at the company’s suppliers resulted in £1.5bn being wiped from the fast fashion brand’s value in two days. Allegations that some factories in Leicester that sell clothes to Boohoo pay as little as £3.50 an hour and failed to protect workers from coronavirus emerged last week. On Tuesday, the three online retailers were joined by very.co.uk and Zalando, a European e-commerce giant that had €6.4bn sales in 2019, in removing Boohoo clothes from sale. – Guardian

Thousands more UK workers involved in making Jaguar Land Rover vehicles are set to lose their jobs, despite the embattled car industry returning to production after coronavirus shutdowns. Logistics giant DHL has notified unions that 2,200 workers, around 40% of those currently employed on its JLR contract, will be laid off. – Guardian

The number of jobseekers has surged at its fastest pace since 2009 as the coronavirus lockdown recession has hit jobs hard, recruiters have warned. Salaries for new starters are falling as more applicants chase fewer jobs, as employers across all industries cut back hiring, according to the Recruitment and Employment Confederation and KPMG. – Telegraph

Almost 70,000 small businesses hoping to secure emergency government credit have had their hopes dashed after a banking service said that it could not secure the necessary funds. Tide said that it had frozen lending under the Bounce Back Loan Scheme because third-party funders would not support the scheme. – The Times

Lansdowne Partners plans to close its main hedge fund in a move that will significantly scale back the firm’s short-selling activities. The group, one of the hedge fund industry’s biggest names, has told its investors that it will shut its $2.8 billion Developed Markets Fund after a prolonged period of underperformance. – The Times

US close

Wall Street stocks closed weaker on Tuesday following a strong rally seen during the previous session.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the session down 1.51% at 25,890.18, the S&P 500 lost 1.08% to 3,145.32, and the Nasdaq Composite was off 0.86% at 10,343.89.

It was a weaker Tuesday in general for the Dow, which had opened 195.54 points lower, reversing some of the gains recorded in the previous session as major indices shook off concerns around a continued rise in new Covid-19 cases across the United States.

However, while investors were seemingly able to shake off those fears on Monday, concerns around the global economic outlook as a result of the pandemic were weighing on sentiment on Tuesday after the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development stated unemployment would reach its highest level since the Great Depression - and may not return to pre-outbreak levels until 2022.

A general sense of dread coming into second-quarter earnings season also seemed to be impacting sentiment, with fast-food chain Shake Shack warning of a 39% sales drop in June alone not helping matters much.

On the macro front, the government's Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey revealed job openings had unexpectedly increased in May as the economy awoke from its slumber.