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Having seesawed over the first two sessions of the week, the UK’s benchmark index closed flat on Wednesday as mining stocks tracked commodity prices higher and helped to offset an unexpected drop in US housebuilding.

The FTSE 100 index slipped just 3.8 points to close 0.1% weaker at 5,342.1, though market traders noted it continues to hold onto the 5,300-point resistance level. The FTSE 250 index took on 0.3% or 29.9 points to settle at 9,431.1.

Exactly half of the FTSE 100 components managed to rack up at least some gains by the end of the mid-week session, with high street retailer Marks & Spencer the standout winner, 5.9% higher following news its 20-month search for a new chief executive has finally come to an end.

M&S today announced Stuart Rose will be replaced by Morrison Supermarkets’ Marc Bolland next year. Shares in the latter company fell back 4.9%.

ITV also had a new appointment to announce, which sent the mid-cap stock up 3.5%. The broadcaster’s Michael Grade will hand over the chairman position to Archie Norman in January.

Among economic news today, minutes from the Bank of England’s latest monetary policy committee meeting revealed that while seven of the nine policy makers voted to extend the bond purchasing programme by £25 billion to £200 billion in total, one favoured no change and another had pushed for a £40 billion increase. The minutes also revealed that the preliminary estimate of third-quarter gross domestic product had come as a surprise to the committee. The pound fell in value against the euro and dollar following the news.

Across the pond, US housebuilders began the construction of just 529,000 homes in October—the lowest level since April’s record low and an 11% decline year-on-year. House construction firms are currently waiting to see if the US government will extend a first-time buyer incentive scheme.

The figures would likely have impacted Wolseley's shares, as the building materials supplier generates much of its revenue in the US, but investors were already occupied with digesting the firm's 45% drop in quarterly profit before exceptional items, and as such the stock was dragged 3.6% lower.

Returning to equities leaderboard, metal extractors Fresnillo, Xstrata and Lonmin led the mining sector higher, with gains of 3.6%-4.9% apiece, as commodity prices climbed on the London Metal Exchange.

The M&A spotlight returned to Cadbury after Hershey and Ferrero separately announced they are evaluating their options, without either mentioning the other, following a media report that the two are in talks over a combined bid for the UK confectioner. Morningstar analyst Erin Swanson believes an all-cash offer from the two could prove to be more attractive to Cadbury shareholders than the current cash-and-stock offer from Kraft. Read more on our view here. Cadbury shares enjoyed a 1.2% rise, sweetened by speculation of a bidding war.

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