FTSE 100 winners and losers as markets await US election results

London’s leading index has been bouncing around all day, and performance has been mixed. We’ve picked out some of the highlights.

A quarter that included a successful mission to deflect the path of an asteroid today helped shares in Smiths Group (LSE:SMIN) make up lost ground after recent FTSE 100 underperformance.

Having missed out on October’s improvement in stock market sentiment, the blue-chip stalwart just surged 54p to 1,605.5p, thanks to a robust start to its new financial year and 13.2% jump in organic revenues.

Smiths is best known for its detection division, where a strong performance among airport customers and large order book have boosted hopes for a return to growth this year.

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All four of the conglomerate’s divisions posted growth in the first quarter, including at Interconnect where components are made for applications across commercial aviation, defence and the space industry.

Interconnect boasts 60 years of participation in successful space missions including to Venus and Mars, but reckons its recent participation in a cosmic crash is its proudest yet.

Its high-power waveguide isolator is just 30 millimetres wide and has played a role in NASA’s £240 million Double Asteroid Redirection Test programme, which last month reported a successful mission to deflect an asteroid.

Back on Earth, Smiths said the rest of the Interconnect division benefited from stronger growth in semiconductor business and continued progress in satellite communications.

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It means the company overall remains comfortable with full-year guidance for revenues growth of 4-4.5% and moderate margin improvement, despite the impact of economic uncertainty, supply challenges and stronger comparators.

The company, which is nearing the completion of a £742 million share buyback programme, will have the chance to showcase its technology and prospects when it holds a capital markets day for investors at Tate Modern tomorrow.

Analysts at Stifel have a target price of 1,800p and said there was scope for upgrades as the financial year progresses.

It said: “We cannot remember a time when Smiths grew its sales at anything like the rate achieved in this period. With organic growth acceleration being the group's key objective and main value driver, this is an important breakthrough in our view.”

Among other “buy” recommendations, US bank Jefferies has a price target of 1,740p and Investec is at 1,800p.

The performance of Smiths was one of the few blue-chip highlights in a session when the prospect of political gridlock in Washington following midterm elections was accompanied by nerves ahead of tomorrow’s October US inflation figure.

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Hopes for a slowing in the pace of monetary policy tightening has helped the FTSE 100 index to rally from 6,826 on 12 October to a recent high of 7334, although the top flight fell back 28.57 points to 7277.57 today.

The laggards included BT Group (LSE:BT.A), whose decline of 3.1p to 114.35p dashed hopes of a recovery after Thursday’s disappointing half-year results sent shares sharply lower.

Paddy Power owner Flutter Entertainment (LSE:FLTR) fell 10p to 11,775p, but this follows a 40%-plus surge for shares since August as its FanDuel division continues to make strong progress in the US.

Today’s third-quarter update included an upgrade to full-year US revenues guidance to between $2.95 billion and $3.2 billion, as the country’s leading online sportsbook with a 42% market share benefits from a strong start to the American Football season.

On Friday evening, Flutter was further boosted when an arbitration process ruled in its favour over the value of Fox Corporation’s option to acquire 18.6% of FanDuel. At December 2020’s valuation of $20 billion (£17.5 billion), Flutter said the ruling provides important clarity on the significant cost required to buy into the number one US gaming business.

Analysts at Davy upgraded their stance on Flutter to “outperform” following today’s update and ahead of a capital markets day for FanDuel on 16 November. The broker added: “Strong top-line momentum alongside best-in-class customer economics continue to underpin the superior US profit opportunity for the group.”