FTSE 100 vacillated as oil prices eased back following the developments in the Suez canal. London’s leading index shed 8 to 6,732 in early trading having opened higher by about the same amount.
Ever Given, the container ship blocking the Suez Canal, has been shifted according to reports this morning, The stern is off the sand and salvage groups are now trying to refloat the rest of the ship.
The Covid-19 stay-at-home order in England has ended, with people allowed to meet in groups of six and do sports outdoors for the first time in three months. Boris Johnson urged caution as Europe is grappling with rising cases.
Destiny Pharma PLC (LON:DEST) rocketed higher on top-line results from the Phase 2b clinical study testing its XF-73 nasal gel. The gel is designed to prevent post-surgical infections such as MRSA associated with open wounds and broken skin.
Blackbird PLC (LON:BIRD) has been chosen by BT as the platform for its sports programme editing. Blacbird will be used for high performance, scalable cloud-native editing and publishing of content for its media operations.
88 Energy Ltd (LON:88E) said logging-whilst-drilling data indicated multiple potentially hydrocarbon bearing zones in the Merlin-1 well in Alaska. The company added that wireline logging will commence shortly to confirm whether mobile hydrocarbons are present.