7.56am: Hunting and Universal Music
It’s a really quiet morning when it comes to firm information, significantly for FTSE 350 corporations.
Extra consideration for Hunting then, as it flags profitable virtually $68 million of orders for a brand new offshore improvement in Guyana, most of that are for its titanium stress joint (TSJ) product line, which is used on floating, manufacturing and storage vessels.
Elsewhere, WH Smith has confirmed that Leo Quinn assumes his function of govt chair at this time, with Andrew Harrison stepping down from the board and resuming his function as UK divisional CEO.
Looking additional afield, Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square stated it’s planning to buy Universal Music Group in a money and shares deal, the place shareholders will get €9.4 billion in money and 0.77 shares of latest inventory for every share they maintain.
7.29am: UK monetary companies had greatest quarter in 30 years
A sliver of fine information comes from the CBI this morning, the place its long-running survey finds that monetary companies exercise rebounded sharply within the first quarter, with enterprise volumes rising on the quickest tempo since 1996.
Sentiment additionally turned optimistic for the primary time since mid-2024, whereas profitability recovered after a protracted decline, pointing to a stronger start to the 12 months.
However, stress on margins intensified, with common spreads narrowing on the quickest price since late 2024.
Firms count on development to proceed subsequent quarter, although uncertainty round demand has understandably surged previously month as a result of conflict within the Middle East, with issues at their highest stage since 2012.
“The sector still appears to be digesting the implications of conflict in the Middle East. This is not surprising given that financial services firms are at the epicentre of volatile market moves, and that the economic impact of the conflict is still crystallising,” says CBI deputy chief economist, Alpesh Paleja.
The CBI needs the federal government to “double down” on delivering its monetary companies development and competitiveness technique, with priorities together with persevering with work to streamline pointless regulation, accelerating supply of the Mansion House reforms, and deploying capital by way of finance programmes such as the British Business Bank.
7.16am: FTSE 100 set to start week decrease
The FTSE 100 has been predicted to start its holiday-shortened week barely within the pink, as markets eye Donald Trump’s deadline tonight for Iran to agree a deal.
The US President has threatened that if an settlement isn’t made earlier than 8pm Eastern Time tonight (1am London), the nation’s bridges and energy crops shall be destroyed.
London’s blue-chip share index is down 14 factors on the futures market, having rebounded roughly 464 factors final week to 10,436.29.
US inventory markets had been open on Monday whereas Europe took an additional time off for Easter, with the tech-powered Nasdaq including 0.5%, the S&P 500 and Dow Jones edging up 0.4%.
Asian shares are blended this morning, with the Hang Seng down 0.7% in Hong Kong, however Japan’s Nikkei and Korea’s Kospi up 0.2% and 0.6%.
Brent crude oil has climbed again above $111 a barrel this morning, after buying and selling as low $107 yesterday.
“Sentiment has turned more cautious this morning as investors grapple with President Trump’s new deadline,” says macro analyst Jim Reid at Deutsche Bank.
“In phrases of Trump’s newest ultimatum to Iran, the US President shared the 8pm ET Tuesday deadline on social media on Sunday after which referred to it a number of occasions yesterday as he demanded that Iran strikes a deal that ‘that is acceptable to me’, whereas threatening intensified assaults in opposition to Iran that may destroy ‘each bridge’ and take ‘each energy plant’ out of enterprise.
“Notably, Trump stated {that a} deal ought to embody ‘free visitors of oil’, calling reopening the Strait of Hormuz ‘a really massive precedence’.
“So a seeming shift from previous suggestions that reopening the straits was not a core objective for the US.”
