Cyprus rally dies after bank warning

The FTSE 100 index closed down 14.38 points at 6,378.38 after Dutch finance minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem said other countries’ banks may also need to be restructured.

Stock exchanges in France and Germany also fell, despite the Cypriot deal initially lifting markets across the continent.

Chris Beauchamp, a market analyst at IG, said: “Last week’s Cyprus-inspired panic lasted barely a morning. Today’s market action has been almost exactly the reverse, as a post-deal rally evaporates thanks to some surprising comments from Jeroen Dijsselbloem.”

Mining and financial stocks bore the brunt of the late sell-off, with Royal Bank of Scotland falling 2 per cent or 6.1p to 287.2p despite Goldman Sachs becoming the third stockbroker to upgrade its outlook for the lender, following in the footsteps of Investec and Liberum.

Standard Life edged down 0.5p to 366.7p even though Galvan Research marked the stock as a “buy” with a target price of 400p after the recent announcement of its special dividend and an “embarrassment of riches”.

Glasgow-based marketing firm Spaceandpeople soarded by 16.5 per cent or 14.5p to 102.5p after deals with shopping centres in the UK and Germany helped it to grow its pre–tax profits by 43 per cent to £2.3 million and hike its total dividend by 21 per cent to 3.5p.

Fellow west coast stock Minoan Group closed up 8.2 per cent or 0.5p at 6.62p after the growth of its travel agency business through four acquisitions helped it to narrow its full-year losses to £1.3m from £1.6m.

NEW YORK: Wall Street fell last night, but ended off session  lows after the president of the Eurogroup tried to clarify his comments on the Cyprus bailout.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 64.28 points, or 0.44 per cent, to end the day at 14,447.75 while the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 Index slipped 5.19 points, or 0.33 per cent, to finish at 1,551.70. The Nasdaq Composite Index shed 9.70 points, or 0.30 per cent, to close at 3,235.30.