London pre-open: Stocks seen a touch lower

Stocks in London were expected to open a little lower on Tuesday following a pretty subdued session on Wall Street.

CMC Markets’ Michael Hewson said: “Today’s European open is likely to see a slightly softer open after yesterday’s paring back of oil prices from their intraday highs, as well as the fact that the latest Federal Reserve rate meeting gets under way later today.

“While Fed fund futures still only assign a 20% likelihood of a move on rates tomorrow, there is speculation that debate about a move is likely to be fairly robust, with the prospect that we could see further dissent on any decision, which means that any post meeting comments from Fed chief Janet Yellen are likely to be as important as the decision itself. Before the Fed meeting concludes we also have the latest Bank of Japan rate decision which takes place Wednesday morning, and where we could see some further tweaks to their current negative rate policy, as well as the bond buying program.”

There are no major UK data releases due, but in the US, housing starts are at 1330 BST.

In corporate news, B&Q and Screwfix owner Kingfisher nailed an encouraging increase in first half profits and confirmed early progress in chief executive Véronique Laury's ambitious turnaround project.

On adjusted sales that rose 6.8% at the reported level to £5.75bn, or 3.3% on a like-for-like basis on constant currencies, underlying pre-tax profits grew 13.5% to £436m.

Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline announced on Tuesday that Emma Walmsley - the current chief executive of the company’s consumer healthcare division - is to be appointed CEO designate, and will succeed Andrew Witty as CEO when he retires on 31 March 2017.

The FTSE 100 firm said Walmsley will join the GSK board of directors from 1 January.

Water utility and waste management company Pennon Group is line to meet expectations for the 2017 financial year as its portfolio of energy recovery facilities remains on track to meet its target.

In a trading statement for the six months ended 30 September, the FTSE 250 company said its energy recovery facilities aims to reach the earnings before interest, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) target of about £100m due to a ramp-up in Peterborough and availability increases at Trident Park in Cardiff and Runcorn II in Manchester.

FTSE 250 spreadbetting firm IG Group said on Tuesday that in the three months to the end of August, it performed well in what was a challenging quarter.

In the first quarter of its 2017 financial year, revenue was up 5.1% on the previous year at £111.4m. Revenue in Europe was 13% higher at £23.4m, while revenue in the Rest of World was up 18% at £16.4m, but in the UK & Ireland it was down 1.8% to £55.4m.

“As announced on 24 June 2016, IG increased client margin requirements approaching and during the volatile period surrounding the UK's EU referendum in order to preserve long term relationships and value; this had the effect of constraining client trading during this time.

“Financial markets through July and August became increasingly subdued and presented limited trading opportunities for both current and new clients.”