London’s blue chips are set to rally after strong gains on Asian markets overnight.
Financial spread bet firms see the FTSE 100 Index adding up to 30 points when trading gets underway and reversing some of Wednesday’s 72 point drop to 6,270.
Corporate updates are likely to dominate today with Burberry (LON:BRBY), Unilever (LON:ULVR), Rank (LON:RNK) and Virgin Money all updating.
US markets were weak, with the mood soured by a shock profits warning from mega retailer Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT) and weak subscriber growth numbers for Netflix.
Asda owner Wal-Mart saw its worst daily fall since February 2000, dropping 10% and knocking US$20bn off its value.
The Dow Jones Industrial fell 157 points to 16,925, while there were falls for the S&P 5600 and Nasdaq as well.
Reports that there is a split in the Fed over when to raise interest rates boosted Asian markets, which shrugged off the US weakness to notch up strong gains.
The Nikkei in Tokyo rose over 1%, Hong Kong jumped almost 2% and Shanghai 1.8%.