BRITISH Gas owner Centrica begins trading this week having suffered a sharp fall in its share price, with analysts calling on investors to cash in profits and exit their stakes.

The FTSE 100 firm endured an 8.1 per cent drop last week following a raft of investment analysts turning against the stock. Both Bank of America and Morgan Stanley have downgraded their recommendations from "overweight" to "equal weight".

Investment analysts believe Centrica is now approaching fair value following bumper earnings this year, which powered shares 116 per cent over the past year.

The company posted robust fullyear earnings of £2.1bn in July.

Centrica has even brought back dividends for shareholders, set at 1.33p per share.

This has helped its share price growth surpass both industry rivals and the wider FTSE 350 by 110 per cent - according to Bank of America's analysis published by Sharecast last week.

(c) 2023 City A.M., source Newspaper