London's FTSE 100 nudges 2.3 points higher to 7,197.6 on Friday, its subdued start following on from a run of record closing highs as investors look to eurozone retail sales numbers, German factory orders and the French trade balance this morning and US trade balance and jobless data out this afternoon.
Conveyor belt specialist Fenner (FENR) tops the FTSE All-Share board, bouncing 13% higher to 267.5p on news full year results will be 'comfortably above previous expectations'. The engineering group says it is performing well and gaining traction from market share gains, its oil and gas operations being buoyed by 'an improving trend in order intake', and from a refocusing of its industrial business in North America.
Also heading north is interdealer broker TP Icap (TCAP), which surges 10.9% ahead to 480.5p after flagging an uptick in trading activity for the final quarter of 2016.
Forged out of the merger between ICAP's voice-broking division and Tullett Prebon, TP Icap says its interest rate derivatives, fixed income and treasury products have benefitted from increased volatility and market activity following the election of Donald Trump as US president and the expectation of interest rate hikes.
One of the session's main casualties is International Personal Finance (IPF), which slumps 10.8% to 157p after highlighting a dispute between its home credit business in Poland and the local tax authorities.
Online musical instruments retailer Gear4music (G4M:AIM) gains another 1.8%, up 9p to 509p, on its latest upbeat trading update hits all the right notes. Like-for-like sales grew by 55% to £24.4m in the four months to December, leaving Gear4music well placed to deliver full year profits 'well ahead' of the increased expectations signalled at the half year stage.
Advanced surveillance technologies supplier Digital Barriers (DGB:AIM) improves 5.6% to 38p after securing two contracts, the first with 'a major US Federal law enforcement agency' and existing customer, the second with a new customer in Africa, collectively worth US$7m.
Butcher Crawshaw (CRAW:AIM) cheapens 6.9% to 23.75p, despite seeing sales rise 13% in the Christmas period. Like-for-like sales were 3.8% down in the five weeks to the beginning of January, although this was an improvement on the 8.1% drop in the four weeks to 27 November.
Crawshaw's improvement in both sales and customer number momentum has required a moderate level of margin investment and gross margins in like-for-like stores have fallen to 43.6% from 44.9% a year ago.
