London pre-open: Stocks set for slightly lower start after mixed economic data

Stocks were set for a slightly lower start at the end of the week, tracking overnight losses on Wall Street on the back of the latest quarterly results out of Netflix and Tesla.

As of 0720 BST, futures tracking the FTSE 100 were trading 6.50 points lower at 7,637.50.

Sterling was edging up alongside, adding 0.2% to 1.2894.

The latest economic data out on home shores came in mixed.

According to the National Office for Statistics, UK retail sales jumped in June at a month-on-month of 0.7% (consensus: 0.2%).

Non-food store sales did especially well, rising by 1.0% over the month thanks to higher than average temperatures.

However, consultancy GfK's consumer confidence index slumped from a June reading of -25 to -30 in July (consensus: -25).

Retail sales remained 1.0% below their pre-Covid level, but that was the smallest shortfall since September, said Gabriella Dickens, senior U.K. economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics.

July's 17% drop in household energy bills would boost real incomes, but families could be expected to either save more or focus on paying down debt.

"And the renewed drop in consumers' confidence—GfK's measure fell back to a three-month low in July, likely due to the jump in mortgage rates—suggests households may retain some cautiousness," she said.

"All told, then, we think households’ real expenditure will be up around 1% year-over-year in Q4, with retail sales following a similar trend."

Public sector net borrowing printed at £18.5bn for June (consensus: £22.0bn).

But Samuel Tombs, chief UK economist at Pantheon, said: "Good news on recent levels of public borrowing will not be celebrated much at the Treasury, given that the outlook for debt interest payments has deteriorated substantially since the Budget."

Overnight, it was reported that the annual rate of increase in Japanese headline consumer prices picked up by a tenth of a percentage point to 3.3% in June (consensus: 3.2%).

Meanwhile, in South Korea it was reported that exports fell at a year-on-year pace of 15.1% over the first 20 days of July.

Liontrust Asset Management said that its its proposed offer for Swiss rival GAM was "full and final". The UK asset manager that its offer "good and fair", taking into account the current financial run rate of losses, future contractual liabilities and the restructuring costs needed to bring GAM back into the black.

Glencore reported a 4% decrease in own-sourced copper production in its first half on Friday, mainly due to mining sequences at Collahuasi and Antamina, and lower copper by-products outside the copper department. The FTSE 100 firm said cobalt production increased 5%, while nickel production saw a 20% decline. Ferrochrome production was 9% below the first half of 2022 due to planned smelter offline days, and coal production remained steady. Glencore maintained its full-year production guidance.

FirstGroup said in an update on Friday that its trading performance for the financial year-to-date was in line with the expectations it outlined in June. The FTSE 250 passenger transport operator also said it had completed £70.9m of its £75m on-market share buyback programme, launched last December, adding that on completion, it planned to initiate another buyback of up to £115m of shares, subject to approval at its annual general meeting being held later in the day.