London pre-open: Stocks seen higher as investors eye UK data, FOMC minutes

London stocks are expected to open higher on Wednesday following a positive close in the US, as investors look to a slew of UK data releases and the latest FOMC minutes.

London’s FTSE 100 is seen starting 15 points higher than Tuesday’s close at 5,877.

On the data front, the UK unemployment rate, claimant count and average weekly earnings are due at 0930 GMT.

In the US, housing starts and building permits are at 1330 GMT and industrial production at 1415 GMT, while FOMC minutes are at 1900 GMT.

“It is true that wage growth has been slowing and that could have played a part in his decision to change his mindand we will get further evidence of how that is doing later this morning, along with the latest December ILO unemployment data, which is expected to show a drop to 5%, its lowest level since October 2005, and down from 5.1% in November,” said Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets.

“It isn’t expected to be such good news on the average earnings front with a further slowdown from 1.9% to 1.8%. This is particularly worrying given that it was up at 3% in the middle of the summer, so while wages are still rising the trend has been steadily lower.”

Glencore to refinance credit facility earlier than expected

Glencore was shoring up access to its future cash requirements on Wednesday, announcing it had signed a new revolving credit facility of a similar scope to its current one.

The new facility would ultimately refinance and replace the company’s existing $8.45bn (£5.92bn) facility, which was expiring in May.

Glencore's board said it had received commitments already from its senior banks for $8.4bn, representing an increase from 37 banks of close to $3bn above existing commitment levels.

"Reflecting the high oversubscription level, Glencore has currently scaled back and signed in $7.7bn of such commitments and will now broaden the refinancing via launch of general syndication to some 30 additional banks in Q2 2016," the board said in a statement.

AstraZeneca has won fast-track US regulatory approval for a particular application of its most promising cancer drugs.

Durvalumab, a highly innovative immuno-oncology treatment that helps empower the patient's immune system and attack the cancer, has been given Breakthrough Therapy designation (BTD) by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for inoperable or metastatic urothelial bladder cancer.