London stocks drop as pandemic's corporate damage grows; NSF crashes

London-listed shares dropped for a second straight day on Thursday as the latest round of corporate earnings reports underlined the hit from the COVID-19 pandemic, with lender Non-Standard Finance crashing after warning of going concern risks.

London-listed shares dropped for a second straight day on Thursday as the latest round of corporate earnings reports underlined the hit from the COVID-19 pandemic, with lender Non-Standard Finance crashing after warning of going concern risks. The company tumbled 33.9% to a record low after saying the coronavirus crisis had halted lending, compounding the lender's woes after its failed attempt to gain scale by buying rival Provident Financial Plc.

The blue-chip FTSE 100 fell 1.3% and the mid-cap FTSE 250 1.4%, tracking a slide in global equity markets on fears of more disruptions to business activity as cases of the novel coronavirus continued to surge. Battered auto, travel and leisure and banking stocks fell between 1.4% and 1.9%, with no stocks on the FTSE 100 trading higher.

Low-budget air carrier eazyJet fell 5.8% a day after reporting a bigger loss for the first half of the year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It said on Thursday it had raised $520 million through a share placing to shore up liquidity.

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