Global shares fall as investors eye spread of Omicron

Global shares fell on Tuesday and the dollar rose to a near one-week high as investors nervously eyed the spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant and awaited various central bank decisions on interest rate policy due this week.

Dublin

Euronext Dublin was up 2 per cent, lifted by the banks which benefited from news that the Bank of England had raised its countercyclical capital buffer after policymakers said risks had returned to a “standard” level after the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.

AIB was up 2 per cent, while Bank of Ireland performed slightly weaker, finishing the day up 1.5 per cent.

Dalata Group, which is the biggest hotel operator in the State, was down 2 per cent as fears continue to abound over Omicron.

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Staying with the leisure and tourism sector, Ryanair was up 1 per cent after Pfizer said final analysis of its antiviral Covid-19 pill still showed near 90 per cent efficacy in preventing hospitalisations and deaths in high-risk patients.

“Most of the airlines were up similarly,” noted a trader. “They have been very weak of late, and there are a lot of negatives priced in there.”

Among the other big hitters, Kerry Group was down 1 per cent, while packaging company Smurfit Kappa was down 1.7 per cent.

Paddy Power Betfair parent Flutter Entertainment finished the day 0.8 per cent stronger. "There has been a weakness across wider global gaming names so it shook off some of that," said a trader.

London

London's FTSE 100 ended lower as investors fretted over risks associated with the Omicron variant, while a takeover deal at a significant premium and news of a stake change weighed on pest control firm Rentokil and telecoms company BT Group.

The blue-chip FTSE 100 eased 0.2 per cent to mark its fourth consecutive decline. Rentokil was the top drag on the index, down 12.3 per cent to mark its worst day in 13 years.

Among individual stocks, BT Group fell 4.3 per cent after Franco-Israeli telecoms entrepreneur Patrick Drahi increased his stake to 18 per cent, drawing a defensive response from the British government.

Online supermarket group Ocado Group jumped 5.5 per cent to the top of the FTSE 100 on winning a patent infringement lawsuit against Norwegian robotics company AutoStore Holdings in the International Trade Commission.

Public transport group National Express also rose, by 1.7 per cent, after saying it is acquiring rival StageCoach, up 10.5 per cent, in an all-share deal.

Europe

European shares reversed early gains to end lower for a fifth straight session as technology stocks weighed, while the healthcare sector dipped despite a 12.6 per cent surge in Vifor Pharma.

The pan-European Stoxx 600 index fell 0.8 per cent, hitting session lows after data showed US producer prices came in hotter than expected.

Tech stocks lost 2.1 per cent, tracking US peers, while the healthcare index slipped 1.2 per cent.

UniCredit firmed 4.6 per cent after HSBC raised the Italian lender's target price, while ArcelorMittal advanced 8.1 per cent after the world's largest steelmaker announced plans to repurchase some of its debt.

New York

The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq fell more than 1 per cent each after data showed producer prices increased more than expected in November and ahead of a potential decision on faster tapering from the US Federal Reserve on Wednesday.

Declines were led by megacap technology stocks, with Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Tesla, Alphabet and Amazon.com falling between 1.3 per cent and 4 per cent.

Apple fell 1.6 per cent, but stayed on track to become the world's first $3 trillion company by market value.

Beyond Meat firmed 6.7 per cent after Piper Sandler upgraded the plant-based meat maker's stock to "neutral" from "underweight". – Additional reporting: agencies