Friday, 16th June: FTSE started the day off right, recovering from yesterdays economic antics, and was up 0.28% at 7440. Rolls-Royce in particular had an upbeat start to the day, after revealing that all business are performing in-line with expectations, and the outlook for the remainder of 2017 stays the same. What looks particularly interesting for the group though is the demand for a new mid-market jet. The project would entail collaborating with Boeing to fill a gap in the market with a new airplane that comes in between narrow-body jets and long-haul aircraft, and would seat between 220-260 passengers. As a result of the positive trading update and new opportunities arising for the group, shares were up 1.76% to 910p by mid-day.
Tesco also started the day off strong and opened 4.5% higher at 188p after revealing their strongest quarterly sales performance in the UK in seven years. The rise in share price was however temporary, as by 11:00am they were down 0.60% at 178p due to wider concerns regarding deteriorating consumer environment in Britain, as well as lower international sales.
In the afternoon, some interesting news cropped up and quickly took over headlines. This was of course the news surrounding a £10.7bn deal for Amazon to acquire American based grocer, Whole Foods Market. Apart from the fact that Whole Foods will continue to operate under their existing brand, there hasn’t been a great deal of information released about anything else regarding this acquisition, which is set to be completed during the second half of 2017. The rest of the supermarkets in the industry were shaken, and began to suffer after the news surfaced in both the US and Europe. Ahold Delhaize, a Dutch supermarket chain, dropped around 7.5%, and a few French supermarkets’ share price also fell. In the UK, the likes of Tesco, Sainsbury, & Ocado were also affected by the news. In the US, the large retailers which dominate the states, Wal-Mart and Target, also took a hit as their share prices dropped.
The FTSE closed up and ended the week on a more positive note after dealing with a fair amount of commotion, largely due to the economic events which have been taking place. The FTSE started off the week at 7512, and hit its lowest on Thursday at 7419. The week finished off up 0.60% at 7464.