London pre-open: Stocks to edge higher ahead of Greek vote

The top flight index is being called to start the day three tenths of a percentage point higher, following the positive close on Wall Street last Friday and ahead of this morning's final vote in the Greek parliament to choose a new president.

Should Greece's ruling coalition not garner the 180 votes needed for their presidential candidate then Athens will have to dissolve parliament and set a course for snap elections, with the risk for greater political uncertainty which that would entail.

On Friday, the S&P 500 finished the session up by seven points to 2,089 and the Dow Jones Industrials by 24 points to 18,054. However, the largest gains were to be seen in the Russell 2000 small cap gauge, this year's laggard among the main benchmarks. The Nasdaq Composite continued its climb back towards its record early-2000 levels.

Acting as a backdrop, investors were monitoring the situation in Libya, where on Friday government forces launched airstrikes against rebel artillery units which had fired on the Es Sider oil export terminal earlier in the week. At last count that Mediterranean country´s oil production was running at approximately 352,000 barrels a day, versus the about 850,000 barrel a day pace reached in October.

BG Group loads first cargo from Queensland Curtis facility

Exploration outfit BG Group announced that on 28 December it began loading the first cargo for liquified natural gas (LNG) from its Queensland Curtis LNG facility onto the Methane Rita Andrea vessel. The second cargo of LNG was scheduled to be loaded onto a carrier which was due to arrive in the first week of January.

The owners of collapsed parcel courier City Link have said they "very much regret" that staff were told of the company's entry into administration on Christmas Day. Better Capital, run by Jon Moulton, said in a statement to the London Stock Exchange that the appointment of administrator Ernst & Young was leaked ahead of the planned announcement.