Markets Round Up on 12th October 2017
Hi all, from to day we are switching from preparing a daily summary of the business news in one post to posting separate posts of the stories we think will be most relevant to our visitors in the UK SME sector.
This morning we posted a summary covering what happened yesterday and overnight. Here is the market round up prepared this evening on Thursday 12th October 2017.
Stock Markets
After the US markets responded positively to the FOMC minutes with all three indexes closing at records. The UK markets traded positively The FTSE 100 closed at 7556.24 up 22.43 or 0.3% on the day and the FTSE 250 closed at 20,251.2 up 83.5 points or 0.4%.
The FTSE 100 had 78 climbers and 21 fallers with Unilever, Reckitt Beckinser, BP, Glaxo & Barclays leading the climbers with HSBC and British American Tobacco slipping.
European shares were far more muted with most markets treading water. The Euro Stoxx 50 fell fractionally 0.05% to 3605.54. The German, French and Spanish indexes were equally flat with only the Italian market having any excitement, falling 0.68% to 22,398.51.
Negative sentiment over Brexit seems to be swaying European investors. The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier has said he will not recommend that talks should start on the post-Brexit UK/EU trade relationship at next week’s European Council summit. Barnier said this week’s fifth round of negotiations ended without making any “great steps forward” and there was “deadlock” on the UK’s financial settlement.
At the time of writing the US markets have had a muted open with not much movement shown as investors took a breath after yesterdays excesses.
Currency
The pound strengthened today in perverse reaction to the stalling brexit talks and is at 1.12 Euros and $1.3263 US Dollars. The Swedish Krone however reacted negatively to the fall in oil down 0.9% against the dollar.
Commodities
Oil prices fell with WTI down almost 2% to $50.3 and Brent down 1.5% to $56.07 as U.S. fuel inventories rose despite efforts by OPEC to cut production.
Natural Gas however climbed 3.2% and this supported the Canadian dollar.
Gold prices held near two-week highs at $1293 as focus shifted to U.S inflation figures due on Friday which are expected to give more clues on monetary policy.
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