Travel&Leisure stocks pace gains, miners drop

Travel&Leisure stocks paced gains on the top flight index at the end of the week, against a backdrop of falling crude oil prices and a perceived reduction in the risk that Britons will vote to leave the European Union on 23 June.

As a sector, Travel&Leisure was no longer overbought and the risks from the rally in oil prices and Brexit had receded, strategists at Bank of America-Merrill Lynch said in a research note sent to clients.

Indeed, "earnings and cash flow valuations appear attractive, leaving a much better risk-reward for the sector," the broker said.

In terms of the largest percentage gains, Industrial Transportation and Construction&Materials clocked in with the best performance, led by shares of Royal Mail and Marshalls, respectively.

To take note of, stock in the former was back at its May 2015 highs at the time of writing.

Going in the other direction were miners and industrial stocks.

Also on Friday, BofA cut its 'overweight' in Industrial Goods & Services from 300 basis points to 100 basis points.

The broker referenced the sharp increase in 'positioning' observed in its last fund managers survey and a stalling in manufacturing sector momentum as the reasons behind its move.

Nonetheless, it retained its pro-cyclical bias - given its base case for a continued macroeconomic recovery in the backhalf of 2016 and supportive relative valuations.

Of interest, RBC sounded an upbeat note on the price of gold, telling clients "we would be buyers of gold and silver equities into expected seasonal strength in August–September."

On a more cautious note, RBC added that "we expect precious metal prices to remain volatile for the next three to four weeks as the market beings to price in the timing of a potential FOMC rate hike."

As of 20:35 BST gold futures for next month delivery were down by 0.97% to 1,210.90 as the US dollar strengthend following Fed chair Janet Yellen´s speech at Harvard. July 2016 futures on the other hand were up by 0.26% to $2.1080/oz..

For their part, analysts at Morgan Stanley bumped up their target price on Fresnillo from 700p to 800p, albeit while sticking to their 'underweight' recommendation.

Top performing sectors so far today
Industrial Transportation 2,980.07 +1.27%
Construction & Materials 5,322.71 +0.91%
Personal Goods 27,182.65 +0.82%
Gas, Water & Multiutilities 6,188.83 +0.71%
General Retailers 2,810.25 +0.71%

Bottom performing sectors so far today
Mining 8,916.80 -1.25%
Oil & Gas Producers 6,160.84 -0.63%
Industrial Engineering 8,189.53 -0.62%
Industrial Metals & Mining 1,147.38 -0.60%
Oil Equipment, Services & Distribution 13,084.77 -0.52%