Britain's top share index fell on Monday after posting its biggest weekly gain since 2011 in the previous session.

Rolls-Royce shares fell more than 4 percent, the top decliner in the blue-chip FTSE 100 index, as traders cited media reports over the weekend of a European regulatory probe into the airline maintenance market.

On the positive side, British Airways owner International Consolidated Airlines Group rose 1.3 percent after Goldman Sachs started its coverage on the stock with a "buy" rating, traders said.

The UK mining index, down 0.8 percent, was the biggest sectoral decliner after surging 19 percent last week to record its best weekly performance in nearly 7 years

The benchmark FTSE 100 index was down 0.5 percent at 6,384.69 points by 0829 GMT. The index gained 4.7 percent last week, its biggest weekly percentage rise since late 2011, but is still down nearly 3 percent so far this year.

"The FTSE 100 is seeing some profit taking after a strong run last week. The recent gainers are witnessing some pullback, with miners leading the index lower," Jawaid Afsar, senior trader at Securequity, said.

"The market is looking for a strong catalyst to maintain its upward march. Until then we will continue to see choppy moves."

Mining and trading company Glencore fell 0.9 percent. Its shares rose earlier in the session on its plans to sell copper mines in Australia and Chile with a view to reducing a debt burden, but analysts said that the move was unlikely to make a big difference.

"Glencore is selling its wholly-owned Cobar copper mine in Australia and Lomas Bayas copper mine in Chile, in response to receiving a number of unsolicited expressions of interest for these mines from various potential buyers ... It looks unlikely to move the needle much in terms of net debt reduction," Numis said in a note.

Standard Chartered shares fell 2.3 percent, with traders saying that a rating cut by Investec to "hold" from "buy" was weighing on the stock. (Reuters)

Source: www.businessworld.ie