* FTSE 100 falls 0.6 percent, shrugs off GDP growth
* Banks slip, pressured by UBS results
* Miners, insurers fall but Reckitt Benckiser gains on SSL
By Simon Falush
LONDON, Oct 26 (Reuters) - Weaker financial and commodity
stocks dragged Britain's top share index lower by midday on
Tuesday as investors booked profits after sharp gains in the
last two months.
Miners <.FTNMX1770>, which have added around 20 percent
since the start of September, were the biggest weight on the
index, with Anglo American <AAL.L> dipping 1.8 percent and Rio
Tinto <RIO.L> down 1.2 percent.
"The market has had a good run since late August and it
appears to be on an upward, sawtooth trend, and it seems this is
one of those days where investors are booking profits after
gains," said Peter Dixon, economist at Commerzbank.
By 1100 GMT, the FTSE 100 <> was 36.85 points, or 0.6
percent, lower at 5,715.13 after it added 0.2 percent on Monday.
It is up over 9 percent since the start of September.
Banks were mostly weaker, pressured as uncertainty on the
global economic outlook kept optimism on more cyclical equities
in check, while a loss at UBS's <UBSN.VX> investment bank also
weighed on the sector.
Standard Chartered <STAN.L> fell 1.1 percent while Barclays
<BARC.L> lost 1.3 percent.
The prospect of the U.S. Federal Reserve printing more money
has helped push the UK's blue-chip index up over 9 percent since
the start of September.
However, Fed officials have not been uniform in their
comments about another round of quantitative easing, leading to
some doubts in markets about how big such a programme will be.
Kansas City Fed President Thomas Hoenig called more asset buys
by the central bank a "very dangerous gamble". []
BRITAIN'S GDP GROWTH
Such considerations appeared to have much more of an impact
than domestic data as equities showed almost no reaction to data
showing that Britain's economy grew twice as fast as expected in
the third quarter of this year, though the pound gained <GBP=>.
[]
Insurers were weaker, pressured by a note from BofA Merrill
Lynch which downgraded the sector on valuation grounds after a
strong run over the past few months. Standard Life <SL.L> fell
1.1 percent and Prudential <PRU.L> lost 2.3 percent.
Cairn Energy <CNE.L> top the list of laggards, shedding 6.4
percent after the oil explorer said one of its wells in
Greenland did not result in a commercial discovery, and another
failed to reach target depth before the end of the Arctic
drilling season. []
ARM Holdings <ARM.L> was among the top fallers, down 5.6
percent as investors failed to react positively to solid
third-quarter results from the chipmaker, with negative
sentiment hitting the technology sector after Texas Instruments
<TXN.N>, which uses ARM designed chips, warned on its
fourth-quarter revenue.
Reckitt Benckiser <RB.L>, by contrast, was a strong
performer, up 0.7 percent after the British consumer goods firm
won conditional EU regulatory approval late on Monday to
purchase Durex condom and Scholl sandals maker SSL <SSL.L>,
boosting its presence in health and personal care.
The highlight of a batch of U.S. economic data due on Tuesday
will be October's consumer confidence index, with an expected
reading of 49.2, up from 48.5 in September.
(Editing by Sharon Lindores)
