The FTSE 100 enjoys a good start to the week, jumping 1.5% at the market open to 6,797 as Hillary Clinton makes a last-minute comeback in the race to become US President. HSBC (HSBA) also reports a strong set of financial results which gives support to the blue chip index.
The market had been weak in recent sessions as it looked like Trump had a chance of winning the election amid negative news surrounding his rival. The FBI has now cleared Clinton after finding no evidence of criminal wrongdoing in her use of a private email server.
A Trump win would have created considerable market and economic uncertainty near-term, a perfect scenario for the gold price to rise. Therefore Clinton’s comeback has a negative effect on the gold price, sending it down 1.4% to $1,286 per ounce.
That weighs on shares in gold miners with Centamin (CEY), Fresnillo (FRES) and Randgold Resources (RRS) all falling by circa 1% in value.
The UK market’s largest-quoted banking group HSBC has delivered a good underlying performance, sending its shares up 4% to 618.6p. Underlying pre-tax profit increased by 7% to $5.24bn.
European airline Ryanair (RYA) increased first half profit by 7% to €1.17bn. That helps to drive a 4.9% rise in its share price to €13.38. Fares were down 10%, but so were costs by the same amount. The company gives a cautious outlook, saying it expects fares to fall further.
Tonic water seller Fevertree Drinks (FEVR:AIM) continues its run of issuing bullish trading updates as it once again says results will be materially ahead of market expectations. Investec raises its 2016 pre-tax profit forecast by 17% to £30.9m. Fevertree’s shares rise 8.3% to £10.49.
Computer games translation expert Keywords Studios (KWS:AIM) also says its results will be significantly ahead of market forecasts. Its share price jumps 9% to 463.3p.
Technology group Redcentric (RCN:AIM) slumps 58% to 63p after finding an accounting error. It will have to reduce net assets on its balance sheet by at least £10m and potentially double the net debt figure to £30m. Chief financial officer Tim Coleman has lost his job.
South Africa-based miner Diamondcorp (DCP:AIM) says it is no longer up for sale. The cash-strapped small cap claims takeover approaches were priced too low. The market is pleased that it hasn’t taken desperate measures and sold to the first bidder, sending its shares up 10.1% to 2.45p.
Harvest Minerals (HMI:AIM) disappoints investors by saying it still hasn’t got the trial mining permit for its stonemeal project in Brazil. The miner had previously indicated it would get the permit by early October. It says the authorities should visit site this month, a necessary procedure before getting the permit. Shares dip 1.3% to 18.13p.
EKF Diagnostics (EKF:AIM) jumps 10.5% to 17.83p after saying trading has been better than expected, even after having upgraded forecasts last months.
The sale of an energy storage machine to a customer in South Africa helps to drive up shares in RedT Energy (RED:AIM) by 6.9% to 14.16p. We explained RedT’s business model in detail last month in Shares.
Sepura (SEPU) rises 43.2% to 26.5p after saying it had received a potential takeover approach from Hytera.
E2V Technologies (E2V:AIM) falls 12.7% to 190p on a full year profit warning.
