Strong start to earnings lifts British shares

* FTSE 100 index adds 0.1 percent

* Unilever's "stellar" results lead index up

* BHP gains after boosting iron output

* Most UK, U.S. firms meeting or beating expectations

By Alistair Smout

LONDON, Jan 23 (Reuters) - Britain's top share index rose on

Wednesday with strong earnings from Unilever marking a positive

start to the full-year results season.

The global consumer goods firm alone provided

almost three points of a seven point gain on the FTSE 100 index

, its 2.7 percent rise in strong volume leading blue-chip

gainers.

Unilever earlier reported underlying sales growth of 6.9

percent for 2012, beating forecasts of 6.5 percent, propelled by

double-digit growth in emerging markets.

"They've put in a stellar set of results," Basil Petrides,

trader at Hartmann Capital, said, although with the stock at

all-time highs, he was looking for a dip before buying.

At 1132 GMT, the FTSE 100 index was up 6.86 points, or 0.1

percent, at 6,186.03 points. Ex-dividend factors clipped 1.97

points off the index, with contractor caterer Compass Group

and utility Scottish & Southern Energy both

trading without entitlement to their latest payouts.

BHP Billiton also lent strength after posting

results, up 1.1 percent and providing 2.4 points of the index's

gains.

The global miner boosted iron ore output by 3 percent in the

December quarter, racing to supply more of the raw material to

Chinese steelmakers despite signs of a softening market.

BHP's advance helped to lift the heavyweight mining sector

to gains of 0.3 percent.

This week has seen the earnings season - already well under

way in the United States - start in earnest in Europe.

In the U.S. so far, 68 percent of companies have met or

beaten expectations, with 61 percent of UK companies at least

meeting expectations.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose to a fresh

five-year closing high on Wall Street on Tuesday after Google

and IBM posted encouraging results.

"We're still in a bull market on the FTSE. All the focus is

on the U.S. earnings, which have been surprisingly good, and

that's what's driving the markets at the moment, with decent

earnings from the UK supporting sentiment as well," Fawad

Razaqzada, market strategist at GFT, said.

"There is no reason that the market should be going down at

this stage."

Global stocks were also supported after Republican leaders

in the U.S. House of Representatives said they aimed to pass a

bill to extend the U.S. debt limit on Wednesday.

The White House said this would remove uncertainty about the

issue, although Razaqzada said that while the move was

supportive, some sort of a deal to avoid catastrophic default

was already priced in.

(Additional reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Jon Hopkins;

Editing by John Stonestreet)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/strong-start-earnings-lifts-british-shares-115018927--business.html

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