UK Stocks-Factors to watch on Aug. 5
Adds futures, news items
Aug 5 (Reuters) - Britain's FTSE 100 .FTSE index is seen opening 2 points higher at 6,038 on Wednesday, according to financial bookmakers, with futures FFIc1 up 0.5% ahead of cash markets open.
* METRO BANK: Britain's Metro Bank MTRO.L swung to a 240 million pounds ($313.92 million) loss for the first half of the year, as provisions to cover loan losses due to the coronavirus crisis wiped out its profits.
* LEGAL & GENERAL: British life insurer Legal & General LGEN.L posted a 2% drop in first-half operating profit.
* COCA COLA HBC: Soft drinks bottler Coca Cola HBC AG CCH.L said its performance recovered steadily from April lows as its markets gradually reopened from coronavirus-led lockdowns.
* BATS: British American Tobacco BATS.L named Guy Meldrum, the regional director of its Asia-Pacific and Middle East business, as the new head of its U.S. business, Reynolds American.
* WILLIAM HILL: British gambling company William Hill WMH.L reported a better-than-expected first-half profit while announcing 119 of UK betting shops closed by coronavirus lockdowns would not reopen as it combines its online and retail businesses.
* HASTINGS: Finnish insurer Sampo SAMPO.HE and South Africa's Rand Merchant Investment (RMI) RMIJ.J have made a recommended cash offer worth 1.84 billion euros ($2.17 billion) to buy British auto insurer Hastings HSTG.L, Sampo said.
* BANKS: Britain's banks took a gloomier view than almost all their European peers in their second quarter earnings.
* OIL: Oil prices fell for the first time in four days, pulling back from as much as five-month highs as mounting coronavirus cases worldwide and in the United States undercut market confidence in a pickup in fuel demand.
* The UK blue-chip index .FTSE ended flat on Tuesday as mixed earnings and rising friction between the United States and China weighed.
* For more on the factors affecting European stocks, please click on: LIVE/
TODAY'S UK PAPERS > Financial Times PRESS/FT > Other business headlines PRESS/GB
(Reporting by Tapanjana Rudra)
((Tapanjana.Rudra@thomsonreuters.com;))
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