By Barbara Kollmeyer, MarketWatch

MADRID (MarketWatch) -- Shares fell in London on Tuesday, with sentiment eroding in the afternoon and mining stocks and some banking stocks driving the losses. Bucking the trend, Lloyds Banking Group PLC and BP PLC rose on earnings reports.

The FTSE 100 index fell 0.6% to 6,419.10, looking at a gain for the month of around 0.3%. The index closed up 0.5% on the prior session.

London stocks moved a leg lower after a gauge of manufacturing in the Chicago area slid to a more-than-three-year low in April, while the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index rose 0.3% in February and U.S. stocks traded mostly lower.

On the upside in London, shares of Lloyds (LYG) rose 1.3% after the bank said it swung to a hefty profit in the first quarter of the year, with impairment charges dropping off and no need to put money aside to cover the costs to reimburse customers wrongfully sold financial products.

Also higher, shares of Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC (RBS) rose 4.4%. The company is due to report first-quarter results on Friday.

 
   However, shares of heavyweight Standard Chartered PLC   dropped 1%. 
 

Also on the downside in London, shares of Centrica PLC fell 3% after the utility was cut to underperform from neutral by Credit Suisse, which said trading conditions for its British Gas unit have deteriorated. It noted that Centrica shares have performed well in the last 18 months.

Shares of heavyweight Unilever PLC fell 1% after the company said it would raise its stake in Hindustan Unilever, its India subsidiary, from 52.48% to up to 75%, spending around 4.1 billion euros ($5.4 billion).

Resources were a mixed bag. Shares of BP (BP) rose 2% after the oil major posted a more-than-threefold rise in profit for the first quarter, driven by proceeds from the sale of its Russian joint venture TNK-BP that offset a fall in oil and gas production and downtime at a key Indiana refinery.

Many heavily weighted mining stocks were selling off. Poor sentiment has plagued the sector for months, driven by weak China data and oversupply. BHP Billiton PLC (BHP) fell 2.6%, while Rio Tinto PLC (RIO) fell 2.2%. Shares of Anglo American PLC fell 3%.

Away from the main index, miner Lonmin PLC fell more than 8% after reporting an incident at its Number Two furnace, which has resulted in that furnace shutting down, and it is expected repairs will take 30 to 40 days. The company had just shut down its Number One furnace for a planned upgrade. (Read more http://www.marketwatch.com/story/lonmin-shuts-down-furnace-after-incident-2013-04-30.)

Shares of Invensys PLC rose nearly 4% after Société Générale upgraded shares to buy from hold, citing an improved investment profile and potential upside from merger and acquisition activity.

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