London pre-open: Lower oil futures to cap gains in Footsie

UK shares are being called to start the day slightly higher thanks to a favourable tailwind from a higher close on Wall Street and more dovish Fed talk on Thursday.

The Footsie is seen about 14 points higher at the opening bell from Thursday's closing mark of 5,918.23.

To take note of, markets are pricing in roughly 33% odds that the Fed will hike rates in March, down from 52% at the start of the year, according to analysts at Deutsche Bank.

A raft of US economic data is set to be released in the afternoon, including the latest readings on retail sales and consumer confidence.

Overnight, the Shanghai Stock Exchange's Composite Index finished down by 3.55% to 2,900.97 despite the People's Bank of China's decision to leave its fixing for the yuan unchanged. Some traders attributed the move lower to another downdraft in oil crude futures.

A late report from Bloomberg on Thursday evening broached the possibility that later today the IAEA might announce that Tehran has fulfilled its pledge to curb the country's nuclear programme. That could see nuclear sanctions imposed by the UK, US and European Union lifted as soon as next Monday.

Data released this morning showed that total Chinese aggregate social financing leapt to 1.82trn yuan in December, easily outstripping analysts' forecasts for 1.15trn.

However, figures for new yuan loans and the rate of growth in money supply undershot market forecasts.

Investors will also be keeping close tabs today on two more Fed speakers, at 14:00 and 16:10GMT, respectively, as well as the latest quarterly results from two of the largest lenders Stateside, Citigroup and Wells Fargo.

BT gets green light for EE acquistion

The Competition and Markets Authority has approved BT Group’s plans to acquire mobile network and internet provider EE. The approval was granted on Friday unconditionally without remedies, and allows the telco to acquire the joint venture between Deutsche Telekom and Orange S.A for £12.5bn. BT Group said it will complete the deal in the coming weekse deal is due to be completed by the end of the month.

Legal & General has sold self-invested personal pension provider and administrator Suffolk Like to Curtis Bank for £45m. Suffolk Life administers around 26,500 plans, including 3,600 commercial properties and its assets under administration totalled £8.7bn as at 30 November. Chief finance officer Mark Gregory said that Suffolk was “not core to our focused strategy going forward. Teaming up with Curtis Banks will help it to realise its strong potential, by creating one of the UK's largest SIPP providers."

International Airlines Group said it had signed a joint business agreement between British Airways, Iberia and LATAM Airlines Group on flights between Europe and South America. The airlines plan to seek approval from the competition authorities in South America and will inform the regulatory authorities in the European Union.