Market Live Email
Hochschild FY earnings jump amid geopolitical turmoil, Balfour Beatty FY profits boosted by UK construction performance
By Iain Gilbert
Date: Wednesday 11 Mar 2026
(Sharecast News) - LONDON PRE-OPEN
The FTSE 100 was expected to open 19.8 points lower ahead of the bell on Wednesday, after wrapping up the previous session 1.59% stronger at 10,412.24.
STOCKS TO WATCH
South America-focused miner Hochschild reported a jump in annual earnings on Wednesday as geopolitical turmoil boosted precious metals prices. Adjusted core earnings surged 39% to $583.7m, and the company said it was encouraged by an "exceptional" pricing environment although precious metal markets remain volatile.
Balfour Beatty posted a jump in full-year profits on Wednesday, driven by strong performances in UK construction and support services. Balfour Beatty said revenues in the year ended 31 December rose 8% to £10.8bn, while underlying profits from earnings-based businesses - the infrastructure specialist's preferred measure of profitability - jumped 16% at £293m. Balfour's order book also strengthened, rising 23% to a £22.7bn, including more than £3.5bn of new UK power generation projects.
Investment firm 3i Infrastructure has agreed to invest approximately €300m to acquire a majority stake in Lefdal Mine Datacenter, a Norwegian data‑centre campus on the country's west coast. The FTSE 250-listed firm said on Wednesday that the Lefdal Mine Datacenter was being acquired from a fund managed by Columbia Threadneedle Investments, whose largest investor will reinvest alongside 3i Infrastructure. Completion was expected in summer 2026.
NEWSPAPER ROUND-UP
UK inflation could end the year higher than previously expected at 3% because of the US-Israel war in Iran, the government's economics watchdog has said. David Miles, a senior figure at the Office for Budget Responsibility, said inflation could end the year a percentage point higher than expected before the war, because of the energy price shock triggered by the crisis in the Middle East. - Guardian
Achieving the UK's net zero target by 2050 will cost less than a single oil shock and bring health and economic benefits while insulating the country against future costs, the government's climate advisers have forecast. Eliminating the UK's reliance on fossil fuels by adopting renewable energy and green technologies, such as electric vehicles and heat pumps, would be the best and most cost-effective option for the future economy, the Climate Change Committee found. - Guardian
Crispin Odey, a hedge fund boss, was a "sex pest" who found it "hard to control himself" around women, a court has heard. Lawyers for the Financial Conduct Authority said to a tribunal that the former boss of Mr Odey's eponymous hedge fund told the regulator he had a "real problem" with his attitude to women. - Telegraph
Mark Zuckerberg's Meta has acquired a social network for AI bots in a bet on a future in which robotic "agents" carry out work on humans' behalf. The tech giant behind Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp has bought Moltbook, a message board in which humans are banned from posting but thousands of bots discuss philosophy, religion and sci-fi. - Telegraph
The chief executive of Nvidia has emphasised that artificial intelligence will create jobs, as technology companies become increasingly concerned about a public backlash over fears of job losses. In a blog post, Jensen Huang argued that AI is "essential infrastructure, like electricity and the internet" that will require trillions of dollars of spending to build. - The Times
US CLOSE
Major indices closed mostly lower on Tuesday as markets absorbed the Trump administration's latest remarks on Iran and oil prices extended their move lower.
At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.07% at 47,706.51, while the S&P 500 shed 0.21% to 6,781.48 and the Nasdaq Composite saw out the session just 0.01% firmer at 22,697.10.
Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com
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