AP: FTSE 100 Seen Higher After Gains On Wall Street
Overview: the FTSE 100 is set to recover from yesterday’s slump and open about 0.5% higher this morning following a strong session on Wall Street, where the Dow Jones industrial average tacked on 50 points, or 0.5% to stay above 10,000, while S&P 500 and the Nasdaq composite were flat.
Asian markets were on the rise with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng inching 0.12% higher at midday, while Japan’s Nikkei rose 0.2% to three week highs.
The market was helped by strong Q3 results from Google (NYSE: GOOG), IBM (NYSE: IBM) and AMD (NYSE: AMD), all of which reported yesterday. Citigroup (NYSE: C) and Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) released their reports earlier, also beating market expectations, while communications corporation disappointed with the first loss in a decade after a network venture writedown.
The companies set to report today are General Electric (NYSE: GE), Bank of America (NYSE: BAC), Halliburton (NYSE: HAL) and Southwest Airlines (NYSE: LUV).
Oil prices climbed today with December Brent Crude improving to US$76.43/barrel, while US light, sweet crude for November delivery was just short of US$78/barrel.
Precious metals declined with Gold slipping below US$1,050/oz and Silver moving down to US$17.30/oz. Platinum was US$13 lower at US$1,336/oz.
Base metals prices didn’t see much change. Copper was at US$2.82/pound, while Nickel held steady at US$8.43/pound. Zinc got back to US$0.91/pound.
Morning news wrap
In the FTSE 100, auto insurer Admiral Group (LSE: ADM) said group Q3 turnover increased 22% year on year to £294 million, while the number of customers rose 17% to 2.01 million. Revenues from non-UK car insurance were up 53% year on year to £10.3 million.
Gold miner Randgold Resources (LSE: RRS) said it had completed its combination with Moto Goldmines, adding it planned to move forward to a bankable feasibility study on the Moto gold project.
Indian miner Vedanta Resources (LSE: VED) announced a convertible note offering to raise US$500 million.
In the FTSE 250, Carphone Warehouse (LSE: CPW) said its 48.5% owned Virgin Mobile Finance has acquired Tele2 France for EUR56 million on a debt free basis.
Spain’s Cosmen family has decided to walk away from the £765 million bid for rail and bus operator National Express (LSE: NEX).
In the AIM, Tunisia focused metal miner Maghreb Minerals (AIM: MMS) released its full year results, reporting a cash position of £237,000, planning to attract further investment to pursue expansion into the fluorspar sector internationally. It also said discussion were in progress to introduce partners into the Pb/Zn portfolio.
