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Gold, silver and platinum rise, FTSE 100 set to continue climb

6th Nov 2009, 7:44 am Gold, silver and platinum rise, FTSE 100 set to continue climb

Overview: the FTSE 100 is set to continue its climb today after Wall Street rallied following an update from the US Labor Department, which said the number of jobless claims fell to its lowest since January 2008. Investors will be expecting another employment update today with US nonfarm payrolls data due to come out before trading starts in the US.

Asian markets were bullish today with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng climbing 1.68% by midday and Japan’s Nikkei added 0.7%. China’s Shanghai Composite Index rose 0.3% to post the highest weekly gain in three months.

Oil prices were roughly unchanged since yesterday with December Brent Crude standing at US$78.56/barrel, while US light, sweet crude for December delivery was just above US$80/barel.

Precious metals still were on the rise as gold inched higher to US$1,092/oz, silver improved to US$17.46/oz and platinum got back to US$1,360/oz.

Base metals followed, recouping some of their recent losses with small gains. Copper rose to US$2.97/lb and nickel reached US$8.17/lb. Zinc was just short of US$1/lb.

The FTSE 100 is seen tacking on 20 points in early trade, or about 0.4% after climbing 0.35% yesterday following a slow start, which saw the blue chip index decline by more than 1% at one point in the morning.

Engineering and project management services company AMEC (LSE: AMEC), software developer Autonomy Corporation (LSE: AU) and pest giant Rentokil (LSE: RTO) ended the day atop the leaderboard with gains of 3.6%, 3.3% and 2.9% respectively. Asset management company Schroders (LSE: SDR), catered Compass Group (LSE: CPG), silver miner Fresnillo (LSE: FRES) and telecom group BT (LSE: BT) also did well, adding 2.5% or more.

Telecommunications company Cable & Wireless (LSE: CW) emerged as the leading faller after reviving demerger plans, sliding 6.1%. Hospitality group Whitbread (LSE: WTB) and bailed out banks Lloyds (LSE: LLOY) and Royal Bank of Scotland (LSE: RBS) followed with losses of over 3.5%.

Morning news wrap

In the FTSE 100, British Airways (LSE: BAY) reported a £292 million loss for the first half. The airline said its passenger capacity declined 6.4% year on year in October, while traffic, measured in revenue passenger kilometres, was down 1.9%. As a result, passenger load factor increased 3.7 points to 80.7.

Commercial property company Segro (LSE: SGRO) agreed to sell its Great Western Industrial Park for £110.4 million.

Medical devices manufacturer Smith & Nephew (LSE: SN) said Q3 revenues declined to US$915 million from US$930 million, while profits beat market expectations with a 73% climb.

In the FTSE 250, sugar refiner and sweetener group Tate & Lyle (LSE: TATE) said it was on track to meet full year guidance as profits slid 13% in the first half.

United Business Media (LSE: UBM) said trading has been in line with expectations since the interim results in July.

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