London shares lose early gains to drift lower as investor optimism is quickly swept aside despite a fairly robust showing on Wall Street overnight. The FTSE 100 index slips around 23 points to 6,328, matching the prevailing mood on Europe's main markets on Tuesday, although UK midcaps perform better. The FTSE 250 is up close on 30 points at 16,945, albeit a fractional gain. In corporate ...

A string of strong corporate announcements excite investors in early trade on Wednesday, powering UK share prices higher. The benchmark FTSE 100 index rallies more than a 100 points, or about 1.8%, back over the 6,000 barrier to 6,016, while midcaps and smaller companies are also in demand. The strong start to the day's trading matches a fairly robust performance on Wall Street and across Asian ...

London shares start Friday trading modestly lower as investors look to top slice short-term profit gains. The FTSE 100 index nudges around 10 points lower to 6,788, while the FTSE 250 midcaps and the wider FTSE All-Share post similarly slight declines, with market attention finally switching away from Greece debt and on to an increasingly likely uptick in the interest rate environment. Bank of ...

London shares limp higher in early trade on Friday despite more bleak views after the latest Greece debt talks and limited corporate news. But at least the FTSE looks capable of halting a run of days in the red, including touching five-month lows earlier in the week, the blue chip index nudging 0.1% higher to 6,715. Midcaps and the wider market are similarly sluggish, tracking similarly higher to ...

London's leading shares open modestly lower in the first trading session of 2015 as traders back at their screens after the Christmas break keep close watch on a falling euro and another on latest data about the state of the Eurozone’s manufacturing sector. In early deals the benchmark FTSE 100 index eases off around 5 points to 6,660, with engineering group Weir (WEIR) heading the Footsie ...

Litigation finance is a line of business that is attracting interest from institutional investors including hedge funds and private equity managers as a potential diversification tool. The economic cycle should have little bearing on the outcomes of the legal cases which litigation funds finance, and there is evidence the asset class has limited correlation to the general stock market. There are ...

Non-executive director (NED) David Lowe loaded up on £73,200 worth of shares in litigation finance provider Burford Capital (BUR:AIM) - a big vote of confidence in an appealing but hard-to-value asset. Analysts at RBC Capital Markets estimate the stock is worth 190p, some 60% north of its current 121p stock market price, which values the business at around £246 million. Burford is the ...

As markets see-saw in response to each twist and turn of the Russian/Ukrainian stand-off, America’s efforts to contain Islamic State fighters in Iraq, events in Gaza and unrest in Syria investors could be forgiven for being a little wary. At the same time, if the US economic recovery continues to gather pace and equities take another leg up they risk losing out should they exit positions ...

Medical technology giant Smith & Nephew (SN.) rises 1.2% to 887p after strengthening its sports medicine business through buying medical device company ArthroCare (ARTC:NASDAQ) for $1.7 billion cash.   High street lender Lloyds Banking (LLOY) falls 2.8% to 80.9p despite plans to reintroduce its dividend in the second half of the year after a five year absence. The market ...

In response to a warning issued after last night's market close, coal miner New World Resources (NWR) slumps 18.5% to 61.5p. The Czech Republic-based firm continues to suffer from falling coal prices and will now conduct a review of its capital structure. New World Resources also expects to see a significant decrease in its economically-mineable coal reserves which will have a major impact on its ...

KOSDAQ SELL 553 TARGET 490 STOP LOSS 565 South Korea is one of the world’s ten largest economies and its stock market is best known for its broad KOSPI benchmark. The country also hosts the small and mid-cap KOSDAQ index, itself based on America’s tech-laden benchmark, and it is this indicator which looks to be offering a trading opportunity to chart watchers. The KOSDAQ stands ...

The week has kicked off with renewed speculation of a possible takeover of mobile telecoms giant Vodafone (VOD), driving shares in Britain's second biggest quoted company up 5% up to 195.5p. A report from the FT claims a bid from US telcos AT&T (T:NYSE) and Verizon Communications (VZ:NYSE) is in the offering, worth a staggering £245 billion, if 'sources' close to events are on the ...