LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Insurers' shares paced the market advance at the end of the holiday-shortened week, benefiting from the general 'risk-on' environment and positive analyst chatter.




The FTSE 100 finished 2.90% higher to 5,842.66, with Legal&General, Standard Life Aberdeen, M&G and Phoenix Group all near the top of the leaderboard.

Providing a further boost for the sector, analysts at Credit Suisse raised their recommendation on the European life insurance sector from 'benchmark' to 'overweight' and stayed at 'overweight' on property and casualty stocks, which combined meant they were overall overweight on the space.

"Valuations of life companies have fallen to bear market lows on P/E relative to the market (53% discount vs normal discount of 36%) and relative to asset managers (48% discount vs normal discount of 23%), despite some life companies resembling asset managers," they said in a research note sent to clients.

Also moving sharply higher were precious metals miners Fresnillo and Polymetal, tracking gains in gold, which at the London close was up 2.96% to $1,734.20?oz. and at a fresh 52-week high, having earlier hit $1,754.50/oz..

Market Movers

FTSE 100 (UKX) 5,842.66 2.90%

FTSE 100 - Risers

Just Eat Takeaway.Com N.V. (CDI) (JET) 7,558.00p 13.96%
Next (NXT) 4,624.00p 9.65%
Carnival (CCL) 965.60p 9.16%
Fresnillo (FRES) 714.40p 8.84%
ITV (ITV) 76.38p 8.65%
Legal & General Group (LGEN) 213.00p 8.65%
CRH (CRH) 2,399.00p 8.31%
Land Securities Group (LAND) 677.00p 7.63%
JD Sports Fashion (JD.) 564.60p 7.58%
Taylor Wimpey (TW.) 141.90p 7.42%

FTSE 100 - Fallers

International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (CDI) (IAG) 246.70p -1.24%
Antofagasta (ANTO) 762.20p -1.19%
Aveva Group (AVV) 3,589.00p -0.75%
Auto Trader Group (AUTO) 414.00p -0.65%
Rentokil Initial (RTO) 392.30p -0.23%
RSA Insurance Group (RSA) 381.10p -0.03%
NMC Health (NMC) 938.40p 0.00%
Smurfit Kappa Group (SKG) 2,322.00p 0.09%
Mondi (MNDI) 1,350.00p 0.11%
BP (BP.) 335.75p 0.12%

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