London open: Footsie pushes on

22nd Dec 2009 08:47

Footsie is still making progress, boosted by the good gains on Wall Street overnight. Cairn Energy is the top performer for the second day on hoped for its Greenland drilling programme, which it brought forward by a year yesterday. The shares were also split on a ten-for-one basis today. Banks are generally higher after the Office of Fair Trading dropped its action to curb bank charges after last month's ruling by the Supreme Court in favour of the banks. Lloyds is leading the sector. LSE has rallied as analysts assess yesterday's takeover of dark pool rival Turquoise. Online poker and casino group 888 Holdings has agreed to pay almost £60m for the Wink Online Bingo business and says trading continues to be strong and in line with expectations. The UK mid-cap will buy Wink Bingo, which runs several online bingo networks including Wink Bingo, Posh Bingo and Bingo Fabulous, for an initial consideration of £11m. Gem Diamonds subsidiary Kimberley Diamonds has entered into an agreement to sell yellow diamonds from the Ellendale mine in Western Australia to Laurelton Diamonds, which is owned by the US jeweller Tiffany. A Carillion joint venture has been awarded a £157m contract to design, build, finance and maintain Phase 1b of Toronto's Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH).