Tuesday preview: BoE's Haskel and McCafferty, Petrofac in focus
With any luck, the spotlight on Tuesday will move onto the Bank of England, leaving all things foreign trade-related to one side.
Of particular interest, incoming Monetary Policy Committee member Jonathan Haskel is due to provide testimony before the Treasury Select Committee, at 1000 BST.
According to some observers, Mr.Haskel's views on policy likely lie on the more dovish side of the spectrum.
He will be followed later in the day by Ian McCafferty, whom he is due to replace on the MPC in September, and who will deliver a speech at the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum at 1030 BST, followed by a Questions and Answers session.
Given that McCafferty voted for a hike in Bank Rate at the last meeting of the MPC, it is possible that Haskel's appointment might tilt the balance of opinions at the Old Lady of Threadneedle Street back towards a more dovish stance.
On 20 June, the MPC voted 6-3 to keep Bank Rate at 0.50%, with McCafferty and colleagues Michael Saunders and Andrew Haldane voting for a 25 basis point increase.
The economic event calendar is otherwise quite sparse in the UK, as in the other main geographical areas, with only the CBI's Distributive Trades Index for June scheduled for release, at 1100 BST.
As an aside, the European Union's General Affairs Council is due to meet, in Luxembourg, with the state-of-play of talks with Britain on its withdrawal set to be discussed.
Stateside, investors will be waiting on the release of the S&P-Case Shiller home price index for April, alongside the Conference Board's consumer confidence gauge for June.
Oil field services outfit Petrofac is among the outfits that are set to update the markets on Tuesday.
Analyst James Hubbard at Numis anticipated that in its trading update the company would provide guidance on first half net profits, order intake and its order backlog as at 31 May, as well its net debt burden - or lack thereof - as of 30 June.
Hubbard had penciled-in first half underlying profit of $160m and full-year profits of $332m (consensus: $286m).
However, he conceded that there had been little news of larger order awards over the past two months, with negative implications for his above-target 2018 forecast for profits.
It likely also meant that the first half backlog was likely to fall below the $10bn mark, possibly to between $8.5-$9.5bn as of the end of May.
On a more positive note, net debt was seen declining from $984m one year ago to $296m.
At 4.7 times its 2019 EV/EBITDA, the shares were trading at a discount to the wider sector's 7.0 times multiple, potentially justified by the ongoing SFO investigation and uncertainty around the rate of build in its backlog.
But with new SFO director Lisa Osofsky incoming in September, he expected cant progress on already opened investigations into existing employees for at least several more months.
Tuesday June 26
INTERIMS
Blue Prism Group
INTERIM DIVIDEND PAYMENT DATE
UDG Healthcare Public Limited Company
FINALS
Carpetright, HML Holdings, Northgate, Thruvision Group
EGMS
CVC Credit Partners European Opportunities Ltd GBP, JZ Capital Partners Ltd
AGMS
Achp, Altus Strategies , Capita, Chesterfield Resources , Echo Energy , Faroe Petroleum, Griffin Mining Ltd., Hummingbird Resources, JZ Capital Partners Ltd, LXI Reit , Marwyn Value Investors Limited, Morses Club , Surgical Innovations Group, Trans-Siberian Gold, Universe Group, Westminster Group
TRADING ANNOUNCEMENTS
Capita
UK ECONOMIC ANNOUNCEMENTS
BBA Mortgage Lending Figures (09:30)
CBI Distributive Trades Surveys (11:00)
FINAL DIVIDEND PAYMENT DATE
Aberdeen New Thai Inv Trust, Spire Healthcare Group