Rising global stock markets and oil prices helped London shares to get off to a strong start on Thursday.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 620 points to 16286 and the Shanghai Composite advanced 5.3%.
The prices of a barrel of Brent and US light crude were both up nearly 4%, taking the latter to more than US$40.
The FTSE 100 Index rose 121.68 points to 6100, Frankfurt's DAX lifted 280 points and France's CAC-40 increased 112 points.
In equities, oil giant BP (LON:BP.) benefited from the higher crude price with a 8.15p bounce to 339.35p while Royal Dutch Shell (LON:RDSB) gushed 36.5p to 1622p.
Miners were also making progress on the China news. Anglo American (LON:AAL) rose 36.7p to 701p, Rio Tinto (LON:RIO) strengthened 72p to 2272p and BHP Billiton (LON:BLT) hardened 46p to 1055.5p.
Speculation that the US Federal Reserve will hold back from raising interest rates next month also lifted sentiment.
Michael Hewson at CMC Markets said: "Now the talk is less of when the Fed will raise rates but more of whether they should, or even whether they should implement further easing in the form of QE4."
In corporate news, recruitment firm Hays (LON:HAS) rose 2.9p to 157.1p as it reported 17% headline growth in annual operating profit despite a £9.6mln foreign exchange headwind.
Gold miner Petropavlovsk (LON:POG) sparkled 0.17p to 5.87p after forecasting significantly higher second-half production.
Sierra Rutile (LON:SRX) subsided 1.5p to 20.75p on news of a first-half loss, although it said falling costs had put it on track to hit full-year targets.