GSK enters Covid-19 partnership with CureVac, Anglo American reports bumper sales for De Beers
London open
The FTSE 100 is expected to open 31 points higher on Wednesday, having closed up 0.78% on Tuesday at 6,516.65.
Stocks to watch
GlaxoSmithKline and CureVac on Wednesday announced a new €150m collaboration to develop a vaccine to combat emerging variants of Covid-19. GSK added that it would also support the manufacture of up to 100m doses of CureVac's first generation Covid-19 vaccine candidate CVnCoV in 2021.
Anglo American updated the market on the value of rough diamond sales for the first sales cycle for 2021 at De Beers on Wednesday, with total provisional sales coming in at $650m (£476.04m). That compared with $452m in the prior cycle of 2020, and was an increase from $551m a year earlier, in the first sales cycle of the prior year. Due to ongoing Covid-19 restrictions, Anglo American said De Beers had continued to implement a more flexible approach to rough diamond sales during the first cycle of 2021, with the Sight event extended beyond its normal week-long duration.
Newspaper round-up
Rishi Sunak has been warned by the leaders of Britain’s most influential business groups and the trade union movement that he risks plunging Britain into a period of mass unemployment unless he extends the furlough scheme. Before the budget on 3 March, both sides of industry told the chancellor that the economy was too fragile to end the wage subsidy scheme at the end of April and that he risked undoing the efforts to protect jobs over the past year if he did so. - Guardian
Google parent company Alphabet had a better-than-expected fourth quarter in 2020, the company announced Tuesday, bolstered by a rebound in ad spending during the holiday season. Alphabet stocks were up as much as 7% in after hours trading following the company’s earnings report, which showed it reported record revenue for the second quarter in a row, beating analyst estimates. - Guardian
Rishi Sunak could launch a tax raid on banks to help tackle the UK’s record deficit, according to the investment bank UBS. The warning comes amid speculation that the Chancellor will use next month's Budget to begin the task of putting the public finances on a “sustainable” footing as vast pandemic spending pushes borrowing above £400bn this financial year. - Telegraph
The LV= life insurance group is under growing pressure from policyholders and politicians over its handling of a takeover bid from Bain Capital. The deal with the American private equity firm will mark the end of the life insurer’s mutual structure, under which policyholders own the company. LV= is to hold a virtual meeting with policyholders today to discuss the £530 million Bain deal. A cross-party group of more than 100 MPs and peers have raised concerns about a ban on media attending the event. - The Times
US close
Wall Street stocks closed firmly in the green on Tuesday, with major indices extending yesterday's strong rally.
At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1.57% at 30,687.48, while the S&P 500 was 1.39% firmer at 3,826.31 and the Nasdaq Composite saw out the session 1.56% stronger at 13,612.78.
The Dow closed 475.57 points higher on Tuesday, building on gains recorded yesterday that came as concerns regarding a recent wave of speculative retail trading subsided.
Corporate earnings were again in focus on Tuesday, with Pfizer in the red after falling short of profit expectations and ExxonMobil topping fourth-quarter earnings per share estimates but falling short on revenues.
Amazon revealed that chief executive Jeff Bezos would be stepping down from the role and said fourth-quarter sales had topped $100.0bn, while Google parent Alphabet said revenues had frown 23% but warned that its cloud business was still haemorrhaging billions of dollars.