April 13 (Reuters) - Britain's FTSE 100 index is seen opening 15.3
points lower on Thursday, according to financial bookmakers.
    
    * RIO: Australia's foreign investment watchdog has cleared Chinese-backed
coal miner Yancoal Australia Ltd to pursue its $2.45 billion
acquisition of Rio Tinto,'s Coal and Allied Division, Yancoal
said on Thursday.
    * BRITAIN HOUSE PRICES: House prices in central London saw their most
widespread declines since 2009 as Brexit uncertainties and high transaction
costs dented demand for high-end property in the British capital, a survey
showed on Thursday.
    * BRITAIN ECONOMY: British manufacturers reported the fastest export growth
in more than two years in early 2017 and the services sector also recovered to
rack up its strongest sales growth since last June's Brexit vote, a business
survey showed on Thursday.
    * EX-DIVS: Reckitt Benckiser, Standard Life and Taylor Wimpey
 will trade without entitlement to their latest dividend pay-out on
Thursday, trimming 3.7 points off the FTSE 100 according to Reuters calculations
 
    * The UK blue chip index fell 0.2 percent at close on Wednesday as results
weighed on Tesco shares and the broader UK supermarket sector.
    * For more on the factors affecting European stocks, please click on: cpurl://apps.cp./cms/?pageId=livemarkets
    
    * UK CORPORATE DIARY:
 Avocet Mining Plc               Full-Year
     Hays Plc                  Trading Update
  PZ Cussons Plc               Trading Update
 
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 (Reporting by Rahul B in Bengaluru; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)