Old Mutual, the savings and investment group, leapt into the top spot on news it is to sell its Nordic business Skandia AB for £2.1bn in an effort to "reduce complexity" and pay down debt.

The deal, which still needs regulatory and shareholder approval, is expected to complete during the first quarter of 2012. The £2.1bn (22.5bn Swedish Krona) is payable in cash and is not expected to attract any tax obligations. Sector peers Standard & Life, Legal & General and Prudential also jumped higher. Resolution was falling almost 3% however.

In second place, Weir Group, an industrial engineer, has completed the acquisition of the wellhead solutions provider Seaboard Holdings for $675m. The transaction was paid in cash and funded from new and existing bank facilities.

Shares of ITV were also on the up after industry regulator Ofcom decided against referring the TV advertising market to the Competition Commission. Panmure Gordon has reiterated its buy rating on the terrestrial broadcaster.

Ofcom launched a review in June into TV advertising to investigate if the current model was anti-competitive or not in customers' best interests. Now that this has been dropped, the news should help to remove the "regulatory discount on ITV" in the stock market, writes Panmure analyst Alex DeGroote.

Wealth management firm Hargreaves Lansdown was rising despite Citi cutting the stock from buy to neutral.

Miners were rising strongly following yesterday's sell-off when metals prices tumbled between 5-7%. Vedanta Resources, Xstrata and Fresnillo were notable performers today.


FTSE 100 - Risers
Old Mutual (OML) 123.40p +11.17%
Weir Group (WEIR) 1,952.00p +4.50%
Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,103.00p +3.57%
ITV (ITV) 62.95p +3.20%
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 24.79p +3.01%
Fresnillo (FRES) 1,539.00p +3.01%
Standard Life (SL.) 198.90p +2.84%
Xstrata (XTA) 965.10p +2.83%
Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) 433.30p +2.82%
Capital Shopping Centres Group (CSCG) 303.10p +2.82%

FTSE 100 - Fallers
Resolution Ltd. (RSL) 244.30p -2.63%
Tate & Lyle (TATE) 674.00p -0.52%
Amec (AMEC) 880.00p -0.45%
Bunzl (BNZL) 846.50p -0.35%
British American Tobacco (BATS) 2,998.00p -0.32%
Diageo (DGE) 1,364.50p -0.22%
Carnival (CCL) 2,131.00p -0.14%
Unilever (ULVR) 2,095.00p -0.10%
Capita Group (CPI) 614.00p -0.08%
Johnson Matthey (JMAT) 1,758.00p -0.06%

NR

Related share prices
Legal & General Group (LGEN) share price
Prudential (PRU) share price
Weir Group (WEIR) share price
Old Mutual (OML) share price
Xstrata (XTA) share price
Vedanta Resources (VED) share price
Standard Life (SL.) share price
Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) share price
Fresnillo (FRES) share price
Resolution Ltd. (RSL) share price