London open: UK stocks surge on Fed rate-hike delay speculation

UK stock markets were doing their best to play catch-up on Tuesday morning as investor risk appetite returned after the four-day weekend.

London's FTSE 100 was up 1.15% at 6,911.92 in early trading.

The Easter weekend has worked wonders for the markets, with the European indices looking reinvigorated this Tuesday morning," said analyst Connor Campbell from Spreadex.

Equities were tracking a strong performance on Wall Street on Monday evening as US indices erased earlier losses to finish in positive territory.

Friday's disappointing jobs report was cited as the reason behind the rise, given expectations that the Federal Reserve will not rush to raise interest rates too quickly. Figures out last week showed that US non-farm payrolls totalled just 126,000 in March, slightly over half the 245,000 expected by analysts.

The data prompted Atlanta Fed president Dennis Lockhart to call for a rate hike at policy meetings in either July or September, as opposed to June as the market currently expects.

"This rate-hike delay, one that should prevent the dollar from soaring too quickly, seems to have pleased European investors, with the weekend news that a tentative deal has been reached with Iran caused a welcoming trading environment after the bell," Campbell said.

Also helping sentiment was a report from the Confederation of British Industry which said that UK economic growth remained steady in the first quarter and is expected to gather momentum over the next three months.

Meanwhile, International Monetary Fund (IMF) managing director Christine Lagarde said she had received confirmation by Greece that it would repay an outstanding €450m to the IMF this week.

Resource stocks rise

Mining giant Rio Tinto rose after completing a bigger-than-expected off-market share buyback due to strong demand. The company, as part off its planned US$2bn capital return announced in February, repurchased 11.6m shares at a price of 560m Australian dollars (US$431m), higher than the A$500m (US$400m) initially indicated.

Other miners such as Fresnillo, Glencore and Anglo American were also making decent gains.

Oil stocks were in demand early on with BG Group, Shell, Premier Oil and Tullow Oil among the best performers on the FTSE 350.

Airline conglomerate IAG fell after JPMorgan Cazenove downgraded its rating on the stock to 'neutral', while Marks & Spencer was lifted to 'buy' at Societe Generale.

Market Movers
techMARK 3,183.35 +0.65%
FTSE 100 6,911.92 +1.15%
FTSE 250 17,431.52 +0.94%

FTSE 100 - Risers
BG Group (BG.) 880.00p +3.18%
Coca-Cola HBC AG (CDI) (CCH) 1,317.00p +2.97%
Fresnillo (FRES) 711.50p +2.89%
Marks & Spencer Group (MKS) 568.50p +2.62%
Weir Group (WEIR) 1,782.00p +2.59%
Royal Dutch Shell 'B' (RDSB) 2,177.50p +2.40%
Glencore (GLEN) 287.35p +2.35%
Royal Dutch Shell 'A' (RDSA) 2,069.50p +2.22%
SSE (SSE) 1,541.00p +2.19%
Sainsbury (J) (SBRY) 265.80p +2.07%

FTSE 100 - Fallers
International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (CDI) (IAG) 590.50p -1.34%
Carnival (CCL) 3,283.00p -0.82%
easyJet (EZJ) 1,830.00p -0.76%
Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) 1,159.00p -0.26%
Direct Line Insurance Group (DLG) 319.10p -0.16%
Standard Life (SL.) 479.70p -0.06%

FTSE 250 - Risers
Premier Oil (PMO) 142.40p +6.67%
Hunting (HTG) 522.50p +5.36%
Tullow Oil (TLW) 297.20p +4.39%
BlackRock World Mining Trust (BRWM) 301.60p +3.89%
Soco International (SIA) 165.60p +3.69%
Ophir Energy (OPHR) 141.20p +3.67%
Ted Baker (TED) 2,574.00p +3.17%
Polymetal International (POLY) 585.50p +2.90%
Drax Group (DRX) 368.50p +2.67%
Big Yellow Group (BYG) 689.50p +2.60%

FTSE 250 - Fallers
Greggs (GRG) 1,024.00p -1.35%
SSP Group (SSPG) 299.30p -1.29%
Telecom Plus (TEP) 922.00p -1.13%
Balfour Beatty (BBY) 231.30p -0.73%
Imagination Technologies Group (IMG) 204.40p -0.68%
Allied Minds (ALM) 683.50p -0.65%
Micro Focus International (MCRO) 1,177.00p -0.51%
Indivior (INDV) 200.00p -0.45%
CLS Holdings (CLI) 1,750.00p -0.34%
F&C Commercial Property Trust Ltd. (FCPT) 137.80p -0.29%