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Thursday Closing Market: a rally at last
Markets
by Graeme Davies on Jan 30, 2003 at 17:06
(UPDATE) The market roars back to life amid widespread bargain hunting by investors and encouraging results from AstraZeneca, which offset news of a slowdown in the US economy.
The FTSE100 maintained its strong progress throughout the day to finish 95 points ahead at 3578 with banks and financials leading the fight back after the maulings handed out in recent days.
The market's surge was not repeated on Wall Street where a mixed bag of earnings figures and news that the US economy slowed down in the fourth quarter left a depressing pall hanging over the Dow Jones, which was 22 points adrift at 8088 by the close of trading in London.
In the UK news that house prices rose another 1.7% in January, making it 26.5% for the year coupled with strong UK December net new consumer credit figures helped to fuel the FTSE's comeback.
Today's leader of the pack in London was British Airways (BAY), which bounced back from a recent pounding from war fears to close 10% ahead at 115.75p.
Drugs giant AstraZenca (AZN) also deserves special mention for adding 9% to £20.78 following solid results in which earnings per share beat expectations.
The financials led the rest with a strong comeback after recent depressing trading. Banks had a solid day as Barclays added 7.2% and Northern Rock following yesterday's good results by pushing ahead by 31.5p to 609.5p.
Amvescap, Schroders, 3i Group and Old Mutual finished between 6.75% and 5.8% ahead.
Even beleaguered media stocks had a brighter day with Pearson (PSON) up 28.5p at 544.5p, Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT) added 30p to 527.5p and Reuters (RTR) put on 5.6% to close at 178.5p.
Only a handful of stocks in the FTSE100 actually finished in negative territory. BAE Systems (BA.) led the way with a slide of 4.9% to 112.25p after the Ministry of Defence finally decided to award it the lion's share of the £2.9 billion contract to build two new aircraft carriers. After recent problems with overruns and overspending on government contracts the market reacted with doubt about the decision.
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- British Airways PLC (BAY)
- AstraZeneca PLC (AZN)
- Pearson PLC (PSON)
- Daily Mail and General Trust P (DMGT)
- Reuters Group PLC (RTR)
- BAE SYSTEMS PLC (BA.)
- British American Tobacco PLC (BATS)
- Imperial Tobacco Group PLC (IMT)
- Rio Tinto PLC (RIO)
- Xstrata PLC (XTA)
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