UPDATE 1-UK Stocks-Factors to watch on Nov 15

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Nov 15 (Reuters) – Britain’s FTSE 100 index is down 0.6% in early trade on Monday.

* SHELL: Royal Dutch Shell will scrap its dual share system in favour of a single class of shares to boost shareholder payouts and simplify its structure, it said, as the energy giant battles calls from an activist investor to split up

* CINEWORLD: Cineworld’s revenue has grown steadily since reopening and touched 90% of pre-pandemic levels in October, the cinema operator said on Monday, adding that the UK and Ireland were experiencing greater demand than in 2019

* CMC MARKETS: British online trading group CMC Markets said it was exploring the merits of a possible separation of its leveraged and non-leveraged divisions in order to unlock shareholder value

*ASTRAZENECA: Bahrain has approved the emergency use of AstraZeneca’s anti-COVID drug Evusheld, the state news agency reported on Sunday

*WIZZ AIR: Wizz Air Chief Executive Jozsef Varadi said on Sunday the Hungarian budget carrier was built for organic growth, but was not “blind”

*BOOSTER VACCINES: The British government is expected to extend the COVID-19 booster programme to people under the age of 50 to drive down transmission rates as winter approaches, The Times reported.

* GOLD: Gold prices eased, slipping from a more than five-month peak hit in the previous session, as cautious investors assessed if rising inflation would prompt a more aggressive response by central banks.

* OIL: Crude oil prices skidded, under pressure from expectations of higher supplies and weakening demand.

* UK’s FTSE 100 index fell on Friday, dragged lower by drugmaker AstraZeneca following its profit miss, while commodity-linked stocks slipped as a stronger dollar dented metal and oil prices. * 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 Sinchita Mitra in Bengaluru)

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