London pre-open: Firm start on the cards

12th Oct 2009 07:40

London is expected to get the week off to a bright start, with traders predicting the FTSE 100 will open around 22 points higher, but early attention is likely to be dominated by board room turmoil in two second-liners.The long running soap opera revolving around the chairman role at TV broadcaster ITV took another twist as the two leading candidates withdrew from the running. Former Reed Elsevier boss Sir Crispin Davies and former BMI boss Sir Michael Bishop have both ruled themselves out of the race for the chairman role. In the meantime, current chief operating officer, John Cresswell, has agreed to act as interim chief executive officer (CEO) but has said he will be off as soon as the company appoints a permanent CEO.Troubled sportswear group JJB Sports has confirmed its plans for a rights issue to raise £100m are now back on track after it suspended the cash call on Friday after rumours surrounding executive chairman Sir David Jones.JJB said it became aware of rumours on Friday morning, which were in relation to Sir David Jones' personal financial affairs, and decided to delay the proposed capital raising until it had the opportunity to investigate further. The board has now concluded its investigation and found these rumours to be totally unfounded.Carillion, the support services company, is to sell its environmental consultancy business Enviros. Engineering, sciences and project delivery firm, Sinclair Knight Merz, is paying around £27m (net) in cash for Enviros. The funds will be used to reduce Carillion’s debtDiversified miner Xstrata has agreed to sell its 70% interest in El Morro, which operates a copper-gold mine in Chile, to gold miner Barrick Gold for $465m. Xstrata chief executive Charlie Sartain said the project, which is also known as El Morro, would create more value as part of Barrick’s portfolio.Credit lender International Personal Finance (IPF) said it had seen a recovery in trading that will result in its full year performance being ‘materially ahead of current market expectations’ if it continues.Market researcher and polling group YouGov fell into losses in the year to July 31, but said it was winning market share.