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UK stock markets are likely to open higher on Monday, 1 March, tracking the global mood of equities with Asian shares regaining the lost momentum in early trades. Japan’s Nikkei gained more than 2 per cent today, Australia’s ASX 200 soared 1.74 per cent, China’s Shanghai Composite rose 0.93 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng surged 1.39 per cent, India’s Nifty added 1.30 per cent, while South Korea’s Kospi slumped 2.80 per cent.
The futures linked to the benchmark FTSE 100 index rose over 0.50 per cent, indicating a positive start to the London equities. The headline FTSE 100 last closed at 6,483.43, after losing 168.53 points or 2.53 per cent. The market-wide sell-off in bonds with Wall Street diving deep in red disturbed the equity market sentiments.
The broader market indices including FTSE 250, FTSE 350 and FTSE All-Share terminated in negative territory on the last day of the week, witnessing a largely similar drop at the close with FTSE 350 losing the most. All the three market indices tripped between 1.30 and 2.40 per cent on Friday.
GBP regains slightly
The Great Britain pound (GBP) regained marginally from the sub-1.40 level against the United States dollar on Monday. Pound sterling recorded a major correction on 25 and 26 February, where a unit of GBP went down to a sub-1.40 level from the recently recognised 34-month high of 1.4237. At around 0631 GMT, the GBP vs USD currency pair was trading at 1.3984, up 0.37 per cent from the previous close of 1.3932.
During the day so far, the currency pair has traded between a low and high of 1.3931 and 1.3999, respectively, at the interbank foreign exchange market. The Bank of England had fixed a reference exchange rate of 1.4134 USD and 1.1565 EUR against a unit of pound sterling on 25 February.
Investors awaiting cues
The domestic market participants are waiting for the upcoming policies that are scheduled to be announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak in the upcoming Budget 2021, set to be unveiled on 3 March. With a range of PMI data including manufacturing, services, construction, and house price indices to be released by Nationwide and Halifax are likely to weigh on the London equities in the week ahead.
Bunzl Plc, Flutter Entertainment Plc, Ashtead Group Plc, Prudential Plc, Fresnillo Plc, Taylor Wimpey Plc, London Stock Exchange Group Plc, Aviva Plc are some of the major FTSE 100 companies that are set to announce their respective Q4 and FY20 earnings report cards.
