- FTSE 100 falls 81 points to 9,195
- Gold price rises to another record high
- Trustpilot and Kier Group results impress
4.42pm: In the red
While US stocks hovered near record highs, European stocks struggled with the FTSE 100 finishing Tuesday’s session on the back foot. The index closed down 81 points at 9,195 points.
4.04pm: London and European stocks tumble as dollar slumps
The FTSE 100 and other European benchmarks slipped sharply after the pound and euro rose on the back of stronger-than-expected US data from the retail and manufacturing sectors.
Banks and financials are among the bigger fallers in London, after Haleon, downgraded by Barclays, and WPP, reiterated at 'sell' by UBS, and easyJet, downgraded by JP Morgan.
Barclays is down 2.6%, NatWest 2.5% and ICG 2.5% lower, St James's Place and Prudential down 2.35%, LSE off 2.2%, Stan Chart and Aviva both falling 2.1% and L&G 2%.
This offset gains for precious metals miner Fresnillo, as gold kisses $3,700/oz, and Sainsbury's, which is still basking in the glow of potential Argos interest.
Across the pond, the Dow Jones dropped 0.4% but the S&P 500 and Nasdaq both were down only 0.1% as traders and investors chew over what the numbers mean for the likely Fed policy path.
"Whereas European stock indices significantly dropped ahead of Wednesday's Fed rate decision, US indices stayed close to their record highs," says analyst Axel Rudolph at IG.
Better retail sales and industrial production than expected, alongside flat US homebuilder confidence, "contrasts to deteriorating UK employment data and weaker-than expected German industrial production".
????????➡️????????@POTUS departs the White House en route to London. pic.twitter.com/JRmxwKarwj
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) September 16, 2025
3.17pm: Dollar slumps further
The US dollar has slumped further since the various US data emerged.
Sterling is up 0.4% to $1.3656 while the euro has jumped 0.8% to $1.851 and the dollar index is down 0.55% to 96.77.
This follows the US retail sales and industrial production coming in firmer than predicted.
These figures, says economist James Knightly at ING, "should further dampen any lingering thoughts that the Fed could cut rates 50bp tomorrow.
A 25bp cut remains the call for most, according to the CME Fedwatch tool.
US industrial production also beat expectations, rising 0.1% versus forecasts of a 0.1% drop.
"That said," says Knightly, "there were some substantial downward revisions to the history with output now reported as having dropped 0.4% in July versus the -0.1% outcome initially printed."
US manufacturing output was up 0.9% year-on-year, "but to put it in context, manufacturing output is still 7.5% below the peak level of output, which was all the way back in December 2007", he adds.
"Manufacturing now accounts for less than 10% of US economic output and only 8% of jobs. In 1980, it accounted for 21% of all jobs."
2.45pm: US stocks on pause as retail sales digested
US stocks have started in the red, following the stronger than expected retail sales data (see below).
The retail numbers maybe cast some doubt on the path for Fed cuts.
The Dow Jones, S&P and Nasdaq all started inconclusively, as traders work out what it all means. The main indices were all down less than or close to 0.1%.
In London, meanwhile, the FTSE 100 is tumbling, down 0.7%.
2.30pm: Importance of US retail data
"Does it matter? that US retail sales were stronger than expected, wonders Fawad Razaqzada at City Index, rhetorically.
"Well, the data suggests it is not all doom and gloom out there, but this is probably too little too late to prevent a rate cut tomorrow.
"The Fed has clearly signalled it will trim rates and everyone expects them to do so.
"But the recent dollar selling was never about this week’s likely rate cut. It was all about whether we will get one or two more cuts before the year is out.
"Well, the jury is still out on that, as surely one retail sales report is unlikely to sway the Fed in one or the other direction."
2.16pm: US Treasury Sec lands in UK
The first members of Donald Trump's US state visit party are in the UK, with Treaury Secretary Scott Bessent being welcomed to 11 Downing Street by Chancellor Rachel Reeves.
President Trump arrives later this evening, but deals are being announced or leaked left, right and centre.
For Reeves and PM Kier Starmer, it represents a welcome injection of good news.
The Department of Business & Trade outlined at the weekend £1.25 billion of investment from US firms, include Citigroup committing £1.1 billion to expand its UK operations, S&P Global will invest £4 million in a Manchester office.
Meanwhile, BlackRock has confirmed plans to invest £7 billion of client money into the UK market next year, and is investing £500 million into enterprise data centres in Britain, while the UK's Rothesay will match that figure in new US commitments.
Earlier it emerged that Google will invest £5 billion in the UK over the next two years to meet rising demand for artificial intelligence, in a move hailed by Chancellor Rachel Reeves as a “vote of confidence” in the economy.
1.55pm: Retail sales show US economy far from moribund
US retail sales rose 0.6% last month, or 0.7% on a core basis, both higher than expected.
12.21pm: US stock futures mixed
US stocks are mixed ahead of the Wall Street opening bell, with the Dow Jones predicted to start a tad lower, while the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 are called 0.3% and 0.2% higher.
In the background, the dollar is softer, with the DXY index down 0.24% at 97.07.
Yesterday's US session started the week off "with a bang", says market analyst Kenny Polcari at Slatestone, with alll the indexes closing higher, and the S&P crossing 6600 as it close at yet another new century mark.
"Think about it: the S&P has now traded in 18 different centuries this year, from the low of 4834 back in April (Liberation Day) to yesterday’s close at 6615. Nothing short of remarkable," he says.
However, he noted that the Equal Weight S&P lost 16 points ("and that is interesting") while the Mag 7 tech giants continued to push higher, up 2%.
"The story hasn’t changed," he says, and is all focused at the moment on what the Federal Reserve will say tomorrow. "Traders and algo’s are excited and remain convinced we’ll see 75 bps worth of cuts over the next three meetings (September, October, December), with another 25-bps penciled in for the January 2026 meeting (Jan 27–28).
"The narrative will now become not if we get a cut, but rather how fast future cuts are coming."
Investors, traders and algorithms will be paying very close attention to the Fed ‘dot plot’ that will be created at this week's meeting, the quarterly graph showing where each memnber of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) expects the federal funds rate to be at the end of each of the next few years.
"It’s not a promise or official policy. Rather, it’s a snapshot of expectations. Markets look closely at the median dot as a guide for where the Fed might go," says Polcari.
"It is important to note – the Fed is NOT suggesting that the plot IS the forward guidance. Economic conditions can and do change quickly, thus the actual path of future rate moves often is different than what the plot may have suggested."
Back in Blighty, the FTSE is continuing to wallow slightly underwater, as are all the main European stock benchmarks.
11.47am: Silver linings in jobs data
Deutsche Bank’s chief UK economist Sanjay Raja says there are "silver linings" in the ONS jobs market data today.
"Today’s labour market data will assuage fears of a further ratcheting up in the unemployment rate and should confirm that the worst is likely behind us," he says.
Although redundancies remained elevated at 100k for a ninth consecutive month, the jobless rate stayed put at 4.7%, with employment rising 29K in the three months to July and more people joining the labour force (+30k).
Wage growth slowing was "good news for the Bank of England", Raja says, as private sector pay slowed to 4.7% and sequential rates on an annualised basis "paint a slightly more encouraging picture that wage growth is trending slowly but surely towards more target-consistent levels".
11.19am: Downgraded Haleon leads fallers
Haleon PLC (LSE:HLN, NYSE:HLN) is topping the Footsie losers' list on the back of a Barclays downgrade for the Senodyne and Panadol maker.
Cutting the rating from 'overweight' to 'equal weight', the bank's analysts said the problem lies in Haleon’s biggest market, the US, where sales have been hit by slower category growth and retailers running down stock.
They reckon destocking pressures could intensify in the second half of the year, making it difficult for the company to reach its already reduced organic sales growth target of 3.5%, which was cut at the half-year stage from 4%.
There are also "new clouds on the horizon" in Latin America, where consumers are trading down from its brands.
The trading-down to own-brands trend was also cited in the Worldpanel UK supermarket data earlier.
Barclays prefers Unilever PLC (LSE:ULVR), which has the same 2026 growth target but, in its view, a more convincing plan.
10.33am: Most shorted stocks
DCC PLC (LSE:DCC) and Ashtead Group PLC (LSE:AHT) are the most shorted UK stocks, calculated by S&P Global.
Tullow Oil, Greggs, Wizz Air, Pennon, NCC, Auction Tech, YouGov and ConvaTec round off the list.
The metric they used to calculate the short interest is the percentage of outstanding shares on loan.
10.17am: Tesco the winner
More on the UK supermarket sector data from earlier.
The report from Worldpanel, which changed its name from Kantar earlier this year, found grocery price inflation softened slightly to 4.9% from 5.0% last month, the second month in a row that prices have retreated after growing for a while.
Take-home sales for big grocery groups grew 4.8% over the four weeks to 7 September compared to a year earlier.
Tesco PLC (LSE:TSCO) won more market share than its smaller rivals over the 12 weeks to 7 September, with its share at 28.4%, up 0.8 percentage points compared to a year ago.
Spending was up 7.7% - its highest rate since December 2023, though Ocado Retail (joint owned by Ocado Group and Marks and Spencer) was once again the fastest growing retailer, with sales rising by 11.9%.
Spending through the tills at J Sainsbury PLC (LSE:SBRY) increased 5.4%, taking its portion of the market up to 15.1%.
Lidl was the fastest growing bricks and mortar retailer with sales up 11.0%, while fellow discounter Aldi held its share with a spending uplift of 4.7%.
Asda was the only 'big six' chain to see sales fall, down 2.7%.
9.34am: FTSE pares losses, European stocks down, pound up
After falling 27 points, the FTSE 100's losses have been pared back.
Still, only four of the index's 20 largest stocks are in positive territory, with two of them, Barclays and HSBC barely more than flat.
Across on the continent, Germany's DAX is down 0.3%, France's CAC 0.1% lower.
"Risk sentiment has dipped at the start of European trading on Tuesday, and stocks are broadly lower after a strong day for risk at the start of the week," says market analyst Kathleen Brooks.
She notes that several FTSE companies have been hit by downgrades, with Haleon, easyJet and Domino’s Pizza all lower on Tuesday due to analyst concerns.
The earlier ONS labour market data does not shift the dial for UK rates, she adds.
"Interestingly, even though the UK’s labour market is weakening, the interest rate futures market is not rushing to price in interest rate cuts.
"Traders remain unconvinced that the BoE will follow the Fed and cut rates, and instead, the market sees less than one rate cut between now and March.
"There is only just over one cut priced between now and July, as the market bets on the BoE taking a more cautious path towards rate cuts compared to the Fed, even though both the UK and the US are seeing weakness in their labour markets."
The lack of rate cut support for the UK economy is "good news for the pound", Brooks points out, with GBP/USD up 0.3% higher this morning around two-month highs.
9.01am: Google pledges £5bn of investment, but opposition emerges
Google will invest £5 billion in the UK over the next two years to meet rising demand for artificial intelligence, one of a series of investments that are expected to be announced as part of US President Donald Trump's UK state visit this week.
The funding, which coincides with the opening of Google’s first UK data centre in Waltham Cross, will go towards research and development, capital projects and engineering.
ChatGPT developer OpenAI, and Nvidia, are also reportedly ready to unveil billions of dollars of investments into UK data centres this week too.
However, Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey criticised the proposed Google deal as a "Silicon Valley stitch-up", and demanded that the government put it to a parliamentary vote.
"I am really concerned the government is going to agree to a Silicon Valley stitch-up that hands tax cuts to tech billionaires while undermining protections for our children online," Davy said.
"Parents want protections for children online to be kept in place, not traded away in a backroom deal with tech barons."
He said the government seemed to be signing up "to a deal that benefits Elon Musk at the expense of the British people".
8.48am: Gold hits new high as Fed meeting anticipated
Gold has reached yet another record high above $3,694 an ounce.
A weaker dollar and growing conviction around Fed rate cuts is fuelling demand for the yellow metal and other real assets, says analyst Matt Britzman at HL.
"With inflation still simmering and central banks pivoting toward easing, investors are increasingly faced with a simple choice: ride the wave of asset inflation or stick with cash and risk being left behind."
The dollar index is down for a second day, 0.3% lower at 97.05, the lowest since early July's three-year lows.
Neil Wilson at Saxo's take is similar, that gold is pushing to new records "on an anticipation of lower rates and higher inflation and continued narrative around central banks swapping USD for gold".
With the US Fed meeting beginning later today ahead of tomorrow's decision, Wilson says a "lot of the market reaction will depend on how open the Fed seems to further cuts".
Assuming the Fed does cut rates tomorrow, Wilson says he would "still anticipate the Fed saying that the 'extent and timing' of further policy adjustments will be dependent on incoming data, and not on a preset course. The market will choose how to take that.
"But...Fed cutting into US growth reacceleration could be positive for small caps."
For those who've not been paying attention, he notes that the meeting takes place "amid quite extraordinary circumstances" – with Donald Trump's administration failing in a last-ditch attempt to oust governor Lisa Cook before the meeting begins, as appeals court last night blocked the move.
So, Cook is likely to be at the meeting barring any additional legal action, while the appointment of Trump pick Stephen Miran, chair of the President’s council of economic advisers, was confirmed to the board of governors yesterday and could be sitting at the meeting too.
8.31am: Trustpilot and Kier lead FTSE 350 gains
London's mid-caps are showing more life, led by Trustpilot Group PLC (LSE:TRST), up 9.5% on the back of its interim results this morning, which came with a new £30 million share buyback.
Chief executive Adrian Blair said the group’s innovations, such as TrustLayer API, were “meaningfully advancing how consumers experience Trustpilot”.
He said the strong first-half showing had prompted an upgrade to its full-year margin guidance. The outlook for the full year was maintained for "high-teens" constant currency revenue growth, with adjusted EBITDA margin now expected to be "in line with H1", up from 14% before.
Not far behind is Kier Group PLC (LSE:KIE), up 7.8%, which also bestowed some extra returns for shareholders with a 38% hoisting of its dividend.
Outgoing chief executive Andrew Davies hailed the profit performance in the first year of the group's long-term sustainable growth plan, with operating profit margins moving towards a target range of 4.0-4.5%.
8.15am: FTSE starts lower
The FTSE 100 has slipped 21 points lower to 9,256 in opening trades.
Airline easyJet, down 2.7%, and toothpaste and painkiller maker Haleon, down 2.1%, are bottom of the list, followed by Rentojkil, Prudential, GSK and Vodafone.
Top risers are precious metals miner Fresnillo, up 3.8%, and US-focused construction hire group Ashtead, up 2%.
Miners of precious and base metals are also up, including Rio Tinto, Endeavour and Glencore.
8.05am: Supermarket prices in retreat
Supermarket sector data from Worldpanel, formerly Kantar, shows UK grocery price inflation nudged down to 4.9% from 5.0% last month.
This was the second consecutive month prices retreated.
Take-home sales grew 4.8% over the four weeks to 7 September compared to a year earlier.
Value is "front of mind" for consumers as 13.1% of schoolwear shoppers buy second-hand, the report found.
More on this shortly.
7.59am: Unilever make interim CFO permanent
Unilever PLC (LSE:ULVR), the fourth largest company in the Footsie, has announced that its new permanent chief financial officer will be Srinivas Phatak, who has been in the role on an interim basis when his predecessor was promoted to CEO in February.
The consumer goods giant said the decision had been made after a "thorough internal and external search process".
"Following that process, the Unilever board is in unanimous agreement that Srinivas is the best candidate for the role, due to the strength of his industry and functional experience and having performed strongly as acting CFO."
7.49am: Top-tier Kier
Kier Group PLC (LSE:KIE) reported further profit growth and record orders for the past year and said it was trading ahead of expectations for the new year.
Free cash flow was £155.4 million, equivalent to 125% cash conversion, and average net debt improved by £67 million to £49 million.
With the confidence coming from an £11 billion order book, giving visibility on 91% of expected revenue for the new financial year and around 70% for the year after, the full-year dividend was hiked 38% to 7.2p per share.
"Building on our outperformance in FY25, the group has started the current financial year well and for FY26 is trading slightly ahead of the board's expectations," says outgoing chief executive Andrew Davies, who is retiring.
7.27am: Jobs market thoughts
The UK jobs market "continues to cast a shadow over household finances", says analyst Rob Morgan at Charles Stanley, who highlights that unemployment has crept up from 4.4% to 4.7% this year, while the number of employed individuals has steadily declined since last October’s Budget.
"This reflects growing caution among businesses around hiring and retaining staff, especially in the hospitality industry. Reinforcing the glum picture, job vacancies have been falling consistently."
With wage growth softening, he says this is likely to lead to sustained "safety first" mindset among households, dampening prospects for a consumer-led economic rebound.
For the Bank of England, which cut interest rates last month, the fragility of the labour market is "not weak enough to override inflation concerns and sway the majority of MPC members toward further easing" in this week's meeting, Morgan says.
"Some may even interpret falling employment as a temporary reaction to higher costs rather than a true demand slump, especially with wage growth still contributing to services inflation.
"In short, while labour market trends support the case for another rate cut, inflation remains the obstacle. With tomorrow’s CPI figure expected to come in at nearly double the target, the optics are challenging for further easing. Sub-4% interest rates may have to wait until 2026."
The pound has resumed its ascent against the dollar, up 0.2% to $1.3628, though it is unchanged against the euro.
7.22am: UK labour market 'continues to cool'
A bit more detail on the latest jobs market update from the Office for National Statistics, where the headlines were that the unemployment rate remained at 4.7% in the period from April to July, while wage growth excluding bonuses cooled a little to 4.8% from 5.0%.
Slightly fresher data from August showed the number of payrolled employees fell by 8,000 month on month, down 127,000 or 0.4% year on year.
ONS director of economic statistics Liz McKeown said: "The labour market continues to cool, with the number of people on payroll falling again, while firms also told us there were fewer jobs in the latest period."
"This weakness is reflected in a slight increase on the quarter in the unemployment rate. The number of vacancies also fell on the quarter, though the rate of decline appears to be slowing.
"Wage growth excluding bonuses edged down further in cash terms, though it remains strong by historic standards."
7.15am: FTSE backed for a small gain, UK jobs data as expected
The FTSE 100 is being backed to bounce back on Tuesday from the small decline the day before, as official data confirmed further cooling of the UK jobs market.
On the futures market, the London share benchmark has been called 7 points higher, after dropping 6.3 points to just over 9,277 at the start of the week.
UK unemployment remained at 4.7% in the three months to July, as expected, with average wage growth rising to 4.7% from 4.6%, as expected, though if bonuses are excluded, pay growth fell to 4.8% from 5.0%.
In August, the number of payrolled employees fell by 8,000 from the month before, down 127,000 or 0.4% compared to a year earlier.
Overnight, the Nasdaq and S&P 500 both marched to new record highs, up 0.9% and 0.5%, while the Dow Jones inched up 0.1%.