Thursday, 24th January: After opening marginally higher, the FTSE 100 continued its third day of decreases during the latter part of the morning, and the gains didn’t last long. Reckitt Benckiser was one of the noteworthy fallers today following a downgrade which sent them 3.2% lower in the morning.
St. James’s Place were having a better day after releasing their Q4 update which included an 8.0% increase in net inflows for the year, and a 5.0% increase on total funds under management for the year. The good news sent the shares more than 2.0% higher towards the second half of the day.
Metro Bank made a slight recovery today following yesterday’s dramatic sell-off which led them to close almost 40.0% lower. Today, they started off slowly but managed to recover slightly and end the day c.10.1% higher.
At Davos, former Labour prime minister Tony Blair suggested that the likelihood of a second referendum taking place is now higher than 50.0%, which he agreed sounded optimistic coming from somebody who opposes Brexit, and although the majority for a second referendum is not yet there, he strongly thinks there will be.
Theresa May continues to feel pressure from all sides regarding taking a no-deal Brexit off the table but continues to refuse to budge on the matter.
The FTSE 100 closed lower once again, by 0.35% to 6819, placing them closer to where they were at the start of the year and reversing all progress which had been made.