Monday, 17th February: The FTSE 100 started off the new week by creeping up by 0.28% in the opening trade following an update from China’s central bank regarding the disruption caused to businesses following the virus outbreak and their efforts to ease the negative impact it is having on trading.
Property listings operator Rightmove released their latest survey on UK house prices which demonstrated a 0.8% increase in January, and with the typical busy spring market yet to come, home buyers could potentially be looking at a new record high average asking price. The news placed house builder Persimmon near the top end of the index during early hours of trading, up circa 1.1%.
During the first half of the trading day, NMC health were one of the biggest fallers, down 1.1% as news surfaced of the resignation of the Middle East hospital operator’s founder and co-chairman BR Shetty following the inaccurate reporting of his holdings. However, it wasn’t long until the share price bounced, and the group ended the day as the largest riser on the blue-chip index, up more than 3.0% in the afternoon.
The FTSE managed to hold onto its gains as it closed 0.33% higher at 7433.25, whilst sterling dropped against both the dollar and euro by 0.27% to $1.30136, and 0.31% to €1.2008.