London pre-open: Stocks expected to edge higher

London stocks were set for a slightly firmer open on Monday despite the terror attack in London over the weekend.

The FTSE 100 was expected to open seven points higher at 7,554.

CMC Markets analyst Michael Hewson said the pound is likely to remain volatile this week given the tragic events at the weekend which saw seven people killed and dozens injured following a terrorist attack at London Bridge and Borough Market and the flakiness of the polls in predicting the outcome of Thursday’s General Election. Hewson pointed out that the poll gaps vary between one and 12 points in favour of the Conservatives.

"With fluctuations of this magnitude, Thursday’s outcome is turning out to have all the predictability of a coin toss, and as such it isn’t too surprising to see this being reflected in recent movements in the pound, which did slip back a little in early Asia trading."

On the data front, Markit's services purchasing managers' index is at 0930 BST.

In corporate news, Vodafone and LG UPlus have announced a new Partner Market agreement for South Korea where the former will share best practices with LG Uplus across all areas of their business, including network strategy and development.

LG Uplus will benefit from Vodafone's knowledge and experience to help improve their customer base management capabilities, Vodafone said in a statement.

Royal Mail has agreed to sell two of the seven plots on the site of its former south London mail centre at Nine Elms site to US-based developer Greystar for £101m cash. The combined 2.67-acre plots will be used for "purpose-built, high specification private rental apartment buildings".

AstraZeneca presented positive results from its Phase III OlympiAD trial on Monday, which showed a “statistically significant” and “clinically meaningful” improvement in progression-free survival for BRCA-mutated metastatic breast cancer patients treated with Lynparza (olaparib) tablets - 300mg twice daily - compared to treatment with physician's choice of a standard of care chemotherapy.

The FTSE 100 drugmaker said that in addition to meeting its primary endpoint of progression-free survival assessed by blinded independent central review, the trial showed that patients treated with Lynparza had a 42% reduction in risk of their disease worsening or death compared to those who received chemotherapy.