Shares closed higher, following Wall Street’s strong opening, as M&A rumours continued to flood the London market, with BG and Alliance & Leicester up on renewed bid hopes.


At the close of play, the FTSE100 was up 23.5 points at 5,959.2 with the FTSE250 ahead 4.7 points at 9,820.8 and the AIM100 8.4 points better at 5,982.1.

Volume was firm with 2.9 billion shares changing hands in 308,464 deals.


Today’s look at individual Stocks:


M&A talk once again prevailed as reports suggested BG, up 30.5p at 734p, despite trading ex-dividend, could be the subject of a 900p per share bid from ExxonMobil.


M&A hopes also lifted Centrica, up 0.75p higher at 285p, encouraged by fresh rumours Gazprom is poised to bid for the utility group.


The rumour mill also benefited Alliance & Leicester, up 11p to 1,190p, on suggestions that Spain's Banco Santander could make a bid for the UK mortgage lender at around 1,350p per share.


The continued strength of crude oil futures helped Shell shares add 19p at 1,863p, BP gain 5.5p at 668.5p and Cairn Energy gain 25p at 2,160p.


A trading update boosted Sainsbury, 5.25p higher at 332.25p, after the UK's third-largest food retailer revealed underlying sales rose for a fifth consecutive quarter, surpassing expectations.


Among the fallers, Tate & Lyle lost 10.5p at 575.5p, Merrill Lynch reiterated its sell recommendation. Heavy weight miner Kazakhmys was also hit as copper prices softened overnight. The shares were down 8.5p at 953.5p, ahead of tomorrow’s results.


Woolworths on Wednesday gave a downbeat assessment of prospects for the year, saying that competition was set to remain fierce. Woolworths, which in January warned on profits following changes to a contract to supply Tesco, said: “The retail environment looks set to remain challenging over the next twelve months, with consumer spending likely to remain depressed. We anticipate that competition will continue to be fierce. Against this backdrop, it is appropriate that we continue to be diligent over the control of costs.”
Shares were up marginally at 35.5p in early afternoon trade in London.


The biggest gainer in the portfolio today was CSR (CSR) gaining 6.8% up 71p to 1116.00

The biggest loser was Vislink (VLK) down 2.1%, 1.25p to 57.75 mainly down to profit takers despite the company swinging to a pre-tax profit of 6.36 million in the full year from a 305,000 loss and said it is looking to the future with confidence as the outlook is "very encouraging" due to current outlook being significantly ahead of last year and a strong order book. Vislink still has a target of 70p