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London open: Hawkish Fed-speak weighs on Footsie at start of the week
London’s top flight index dipped lower at the start of trading as investors digested some hawkish ‘Fed-speak’ over the weekend, with little else to guide them in terms of fresh corporate news or economic data.
Speaking on Sunday, US Federal Reserve vice chairman Stanley Fischer said “we are close to our targets”, adding that the labour market had been “remarkably resilient”.
“Looking ahead, I expect GDP growth to pick up in coming quarters, as investment recovers from a surprisingly weak patch and the drag from past dollar appreciation diminishes,” he added.
His remarks gave a boost to the dollar and weighed on crude oil futures at the start of the week. As of 0817 BST, the US dollar index was up by 0.38% to 94.87 and front month Brent crude futures lower by 2.1% to $49.83 per barrel on the ICE.
In parallel, the FTSE 100 was lower by 14.15 points and trading at 6,842.30.
Fischer, who was widely considered to hold similar views on policy to those of Fed chair Janet Yellen, was speaking ahead of the Federal Reserve’s annual economic symposium at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, on 25 to 27 August.
Some economists believed Fed chair Janet Yellen would use her speech at the symposium on 26 August to flag her own thoughts on monetary policy.
“Markets remain very much focused on global monetary policy this week after conflicting Fed chat last week and ahead of this Thursday’s US Kansas City Fed Jackson Hole Symposium. As much for the outlook for US monetary policy as for the ramifications for the Euro, itself hemmed in between a Fed wanting to tighten and the Bank of England in easing mode post Brexit,” Accendo Markets’ head of research Michael van Dulken said.
There were no major UK or US data scheduled for release on Monday.
In corporate news, venture capital-style investor Allied Minds has arranged a one-year debt facility Silicon Valley Bank in the US, while a UK-based subsidiary has raised funds for a biotech project from institutional investors.
Secured over certain group assets, the $20m one-year facility from the SVB has diversified the capital structure and is “a powerful endorsement of the group’s growth and development prospects”, said chief executive Chris Silva.
Elsewhere, Polymetal International has approved the de-bottlenecking project at the Amursk POX plant that will expand capacity by around 50% in terms of concentrate processed.
“We believe capital-light debottlenecking of the Amursk POX plant is the best approach given the steady increase in Polymetal’s refractory reserve base”, said chief executive officer Vitaly Nesis.
