(RTTNews) - U.K. stocks drifted lower on Thursday amid lingering worries about the spread of the new coronavirus and ahead of the Bank of England monetary policy decision.
The Bank of England announces the outcome and release the minutes of the meeting and quarterly Monetary Policy Report at 7.00 am ET. At 7.30 am, Carney speaks at the press conference.
Brexit also remains on investors' radar as European parliamentary lawmakers meet for last time ahead of the U.K.'s departure at 11 p.m. London time on Friday.
The benchmark FTSE 100 was down 32 points, or 0.43 percent, at 7,451 after finishing marginally higher on Wednesday.
Oil & gas company Royal Dutch Shell lost 3.2 percent after its quarterly profit missed analyst estimates.
Gold miner Centamin jumped 4.5 percent. The company reported gold production of 148,387 ounces from the Sukari Gold Mine for the fourth-quarter ended 31 December 2019, an increase of 8 percent from the prior year.
Unilever advanced 1.7 percent after saying it would carry out a strategic view of its global tea business.
Private equity group 3i Infrastructure rose 1.6 percent as it reported a rise in net assets in its fiscal third quarter.
Alcoholic beverages firm Diageo shed 0.7 percent after cutting its FY sales growth view.
Telecom company BT Group slumped 5.8 percent after its profit before tax for the nine months to 31 December 2019 declined to 1.91 billion pounds from last year's 2.09 billion pounds.
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