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London - The eight-day rally for British equities came to a halt, with three-quarters of FTSE 100 Index companies falling, while commodity producers climbed.
The gauge of megacaps slipped 0.2% at 09:55, retreating from its highest level in more than a year. Royal Bank of Scotland dropped 1.7% for the biggest decline on the gauge.
Miners rose: Antofagasta advanced 3.1% after reporting an increase in earnings and in copper production. BHP Billiton climbed 1.1% after posting full-year underlying profit that dropped less than analysts had projected. Rio Tinto added 2.3%.
The FTSE 250 Index of mid-cap shares declined 0.2%, while the FTSE Small Capitalisation Index Ex Investment Trusts added 0.2%, extending a record. The regional Stoxx Europe 600 Index fell 0.6%.
Investors are awaiting the first inflation data to cover the period since the Brexit referendum, due at 10:30.
Economists estimate consumer prices in the UK advanced 0.5% in July from a year earlier. The Bank of England expects to price-gains to accelerate in the coming months, and economists see it bursting through the 2% goal in the second quarter of 2017, sooner than projected before the vote.
Investors are also watching technical signs. The FTSE 100’s resistance strength index, a measure of market momentum, yesterday climbed to 73, entering so-called overbought territory - indicating that gains might have come too fast to hold.
That was its highest level since May 22, 2013, when the equity measure hit a high before falling 12% in about a month. The overbought zone is reached when the momentum indicator surpasses 70 and a pullback from there could trigger declines. It slipped to 71 today.
