The FTSE 100 hit its highest level on over one month as the optimism from across the pond is catching on over here. The British equity benchmark has snapped out of the downward trend that it was since early November, and should the positive run continue we could see it hit 7600 before Christmas.
Shares in gocompare.com are up 4.1% after the company announced the acquisition of MyVoucherCodes.co.uk for £36.5 million. The target company is expected to make a pre-tax profit of £4 million this year. The voucher code site is the largest in the UK, and has 8 million email subscribers. Gocompare.Com Group (LON:GOCO) also stated it anticipates revenue growth of 5% this year.
GBP/USD is higher on the day as the weakness in the US dollar persists. As the US government could be voting on the tax proposals this week, dealers are starting to doubt how much economic growth will added by the tax cuts. Sterling remains in its upward trend against the US dollar.
EUR/USD is also being assisted by the soft greenback. The German IFO business climate report for December came in at 117.2, down from 117.5 in November – the consensus was for 117.5. The IFO report has been rising steadily throughout 2017, which coincides with the manufacturing and services data.
At 1.30pm (UK time) the US will announce the housing starts numbers for November, and traders are expecting a reading of 1.25 million, down from 1.29 million in October.
We are expecting the Dow Jones to open up 68 points at 24,860, and we are calling the S&P 500 up 3 points at 2693.
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