Vodafone falls as FTSE 100 reaches new high Concluding that Vodafone management have "left it too late to pick their poison," the experts cut their rating to "underperform" from "market-perform." The downbeat appraisal weighed on the shares, which shed 3.3 - or 2pc - to 163½p, the heaviest of just 10 fallers in London's benchmark index. Overall, the FTSE 100 was livelier than Monday, when a public holiday in the US saw the blue-chips drift lower. A better than expected reading from an index of German economic sentiment lent support in the morning, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average opened higher in the afternoon. That helped the benchmark index rise 60.88 points to 6,379.07 - its highest close of 2013 and best finish since January 2008 - and the mid-cap FTSE 250 put on 155.96 to 13,654.95, a fresh record. Nevertheless, traders still found time to gossip: talk that UK would have its credit rating cut by Standard & Poor's after the close swept dealing floors in early trade, but faded later in the day. Investors were favouring Standard Chartered over HSBC, on the advice of analysts at Morgan Stanley. Standard Chartered should benefit from the brighter economic outlook in Asia, but HSBC has "an uninspiring revenue outlook" and the shares appear fully valued, the experts said. They upgraded the former to "overweight" and helped its shares gain 41½p to £17.71. Conversely, HSBC was cut to "equal weight" and fell as low as 719.6p before rallying to finish 2.8 better at 728.8p on the announcement of the $2.1bn (£1.4bn) sale of its operations in Panama. On the mid-tier index, Drax was in demand following the release of its full-year results. News that the company's conversion to biomass-fuelled power generation was ahead of scheduled spurred the shares 37 to 641½p, the highest level since November 2008. Joint house broker Deutsche Bank conceded that Drax "is a risky stock," but said they expected the group's investments in biomass to "transform the outlook for the company, and drive strong earnings growth through to 2017." Ahead of its full-year results on Thursday , mid-cap bookmaker Ladbrokes benefited from an upgrade to "buy" from "hold" at Investec, with analyst James Hollins arguing that "retail growth and cash generation is being undervalued" and the group's digital platform "can drive strong divisional earnings growth." Ladbrokes shares closed up 9.1 at 230.3p. Meanwhile, department store group Debenhams, 1.4 higher at 97.55p on the FTSE 250, disclosed that chief executive Michael Sharp had snapped up 50,000 shares at about 97.2p each. Lower down the scale, a halving of its final dividend to 15p saw construction group Morgan Sindall slide 43 to 533p. The company reported 2012 pre-tax profits of £34.2m, down from £40m a year earlier, and said it remained "cautious over the outlook in the short term." Structural steel-maker Severfield-Rowen revealed that following a review of 70 of its contracts, the group's expectations for this year and 2014 were "somewhat lower." The company also disclosed that its major shareholders had given their backing for a possible equity fundraising of as much as £50m. "Our target price falls to 50p, the price where we believe a rescue rights issue will most likely have to be pitched to get the necessary support," said Michael 0"Brien, an analyst at Canaccord Genuity. He added that a share sale would be "a vital step to stabilise the group's financial position and assuage potential customer concerns about the group's viability." He rates the shares, which shed 3½ to 75p, a "sell." Among those smaller oil and gas shares that have large retail followings, West Africa-focused Chariot Oil and Gas plunged 5½ to 24½p, a drop of 18.3pc, on a delay to the start of drilling in Namibia. The company said it was seeking a partner to help with funding. Sound Oil slipped 0.125 to 7.125p after disclosing it had rejected a farm-in offer for its Badile prospect in northern Italy. "Unless it finds another farm-in partner, the company will have to take a sole risk on this prospect," said Westhouse Securities analyst Dragan Trajkov.