Good morning from a very sunny London where the FTSE 100 is up, along with brent crude, bitcoin and house prices apparently – that’s according to some fresh figures from property website Rightmove this morning.
The average house in the UK jumped by around £4,500 month-on-month in January, and the volume of new properties coming onto the market for sale is 15% higher than a year ago. Average asking prices are still 0.7% lower than a year earlier however.
Martin Luther King Day in the US means that news from across the pond will be a little on the slow side today, but there’s plenty going on here in London. Michael Hewson at CMC Markets says and I quote that “this week the focus is set to be very much on the UK economy in the wake of Friday’s better than expected November GDP numbers” and that we’re expecting “data for wages and unemployment for November, as well as December CPI and retail sales, all of which have the potential to shift the dial on the timing of a first rate cut from the Bank of England.”
And as always we’ll have all the latest news from up and down the UK corporate food chain, including interviews with big names from the small cap scene – I’ll be speaking to Segun Lawson from Thor Explorations a little later after the Nigeria-focused gold producer announced it expects to increase production at its Segilola site by at least 10% in 2024.
Stay tuned for that and much else besides, and have a great week.