FTSE up 0.2 pct; miners, defensives offset oils

Britain's top share index rose slightly in early trade on Tuesday, as gains from miners and some defensive shares outweighed weakness among oil stocks.

 By 0805 GMT, the FTSE 100 .FTSE was up 7.13 points or 0.2 percent at 4,202.04, after falling 1 percent to a two-month low on Monday.

 The index has gained 21.3 percent since hitting a six-year low in March, but is still down 5.3 percent for the year.

 "There's a great deal of anticipation ahead of second-quarter results which commence in the States later this week, so I think for the time being investors are generally keeping their powder dry ahead of any details we're going to see there," said Keith Bowman, analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.

 Miners added the most points to the blue-chip index, retracing Monday's losses, against a backdrop of stabilising metals prices.

 Rio Tinto (RIO.L), BHP Billiton (BLT.L), Anglo American (AAL.L), Kazakhmys (KAZ.L) and Xstrata (XTA.L) added 0.9-2.5 percent.

 Some defensives were also in demand as investors, still digesting last week's disappointing non-farm payroll figures, switched into stocks perceived as resilient to economic weakness.

 Drugmakers AstraZeneca (AZN.L) and Shire (SHP.L) added 0.5 percent and 1.4 percent respectively, while food retailer Morrison (MRW.L) gained 2 percent.

 GlaxoSmithKline (GSK.L) rose 0.1 percent, after the drugmaker said its Cervatix is the first product of its kind to show it protects against the five most common cervical cancer-causing viruses. [ID:nL6369287]

 Energy companies were mixed, unable to recover from the previous session's sharp losses as crude edged down, on course for its fifth consecutive fall and longest losing streak since February.

 BP (BP.L) gained 0.4 percent, but Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L) was 0.2 percent weaker and Cairn Energy (CNE.L) fell 0.8 percent.

 Weakness was also seen among banks, with Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L), Barclays (BARC.L), HSBC (HSBA.L) and Standard Chartered (STAN.L) shedding between 0.3 percent and 0.6 percent.

 On the second tier, housebuilder Persimmon (PSN.L) was among the biggest gainers, up 3.9 percent, after saying it does not expect any further land writedowns as volumes and sales in the first half were better than 2008, though it remains cautious in its outlook. [ID:nL6258493]

 Britain's economy is not yet out of recession despite a marked easing in the pace of decline in the manufacturing and services sectors in the second quarter, a survey by the British Chambers of Commerce suggested. [ID:nL6234973]

 Investors will look to British industrial and manufacturing output data at 0830 GMT for more signs the recession may be easing after worse than expected U.S. employment data last week saw a return to investor jitters on the state of the global economy. link.....