Market overview: Stocks close flat on slow day for data

1630:Close Shares ended the session a smidgen higher ahead of a much anticipated meeting of the European Central Bank on Thursday. Stock in ARM Holdings was leading gains after posting a jump in theird quarter profit. The latest data on public sector finances pleased, suggesting the downward trend in borrowing is intact. FTSE 100 up 3.29 points to 6,348.42.

1616: StanChart may be contemplating raising capital in November, one report says citing Bloomberg. During the worst of Glencore's troubles there was already some speculation in that regard. Indeed, one reputed sector analyst in the City told Digital Look as far back as late September he expected a cash call towards early December.

1500: Bank of Canada keeps main policy rate unchanged at 0.50%. The monetary authority also lowered its GDP forecasts for 2016 and 2017.

1200: Turkey's central bank maintained its main interest rate at 7.5%.

1034: Barclays is in talks to sell its Italian house loan portfolio for €1bn.

0912: "Careful with debt that has been rolled into the Ferrari IPO, how leverageable is its business model?" an analysts tells Blomberg TV.

0845: Argos owner Home Retail Group warns full-year profits will fall short of expectations due to trading uncertainty caused by Black Friday.

0830: Stocks have started the session essentially flat, despite overnight losses in Shanghai and to a far smaller degree on Wall Street. Japanese trade data for September are in focus, with exports having grown by just 0.6%, the least in over a year. Sales to China were the weakest, unsurprisingly perhaps. That may be behind the retreat in Shanghai equities this morning, which are paring their strong gains (bounce) for October. There is little on the economic agenda for today, save for public sector finance figures out at 09:30, courtesy of ONS. Talk of lower long-term sovereign bond yields appears to be rather prevalent, something to watch perhaps. Without a doubt, Ferrari's IPO is one of the main talking points.