Indices in London opened and stayed in the green, as a raft of house builders clawed their way higher, along with Euro indices and asian trade.
Taylor Wimpey(+7.32%) were buoyed by the release of a positive update regarding the first half of the year. The house builder described current trade as in line with normal seasonal patterns, despite the UK’s vote to leave the EU. Revenue of £1.46bn was posted for the six months ending July 3rd, with an uplift in pretax profit of £30m to £268.8m. Gains within the sector were seen by Crest Nicholson(+9.61%), Barratt Developments(+6.81%), and Bellway(+6.68%).

Rightmove jumped (+8.73%) after releasing results on first half proceedings for the year. Revenue was £14m higher to £107.9m compared with the respective year earlier, with a similar increase in pretax profit levels, and a 5p increase in the interim dividend to 27.0p per share. The estate agent portal also batted away concerns arising due to the current uncertainty surrounding the UK economy, declaring it is confident of achieving full year expectations.

UK Q2 GDP data that was narrowly better than economists’ expectations did little to move the needle on Sterling against both the euro and the greenback. The data showed the economy accelerated at a quarterly growth rate of 0.6%, outpacing growth seen in Q1 and the rate predicted by an economist poll conducted by the WSJ, both of which were 0.4%. This was driven by performance in both the services and production sectors. The annualised GDP growth rate accelerated year on year, inching 0.1% higher to 2.2%.Of course, this is representative of the quarter before the EU referendum and the outlook for the UK will surely be different in the coming months, as flash PMI data has already shown.

At the close European indices were up as the FTSE 100 closed +0.39%, the Cac 40 +1.19% and the Dax 30 +0.70%.