London pre-open: Stocks seen higher after last week's losses

London stocks were set to gain at the open on Monday following heavy losses at the end of last week.

The FTSE 100 was called to open around 55 points higher.

Ipek Ozkardeskaya, senior analyst at Swissquote Bank, said: "Last week ended on an ugly note, really, as the jobs data from the US revealed throughout the week was weak, but maybe not weak enough to tilt the Federal Reserve (Fed) expectations toward a clear direction. Job openings fell more than expected, and Friday’s official data showed that hirings rebounded in August, though not as much as pencilled in by analysts.

"The US economy added a 142K new nonfarm jobs, last month’s ugly figure was further revised down by 25K jobs, but the wages grew faster than expected and the unemployment rate fell from 4.3% to 4.2%, as expected.

"As such, the data sure pointed that the Fed will cut in September, but the pricing of a 50bp cut fell to 29%, from around 40% before the release of the jobs data. The US 2-year yield tipped a toe below 3.60% but rebounded, the 10-year jumped to 3.74%, the 2 to 10-year portion of the curve is no longer inverted and the US dollar index is better bid since the data on expectation that the Fed will cut, but not in a hurry and probably not by big chunks."

On the UK corporate front, Barratt Developments, Homes England and Lloyds Bank have formed a joint venture that will focus on developments of large sites for housing.

Each partner will invest up to £150m in the venture, to be called the MADE Partnership, focusing on multiple large scale, residential-led developments from 1,000 to more than 10,000 homes “along with a variety of community facilities and employment uses”.

Potential development opportunities will include large brownfield developments, as well as new garden village style communities.

Entain reported strong second-half trading momentum in an update, with online net gaming revenue (NGR) growth exceeding expectations.

The FTSE 100 gambling giant noted that new chief executive Gavin Isaacs took office on 2 September, with Stella David set to succeed Barry Gibson as chair at the end of the month. It added that BetMGM launched new features ahead of the NFL season, including enhanced parlay options and a nationwide digital wallet for Nevada bettors.