The FTSE 100 closed at a 13-month high yesterday – its best price since just before the UK’s first lockdown – before following up on Friday by falling 0.36% to 6,917.21. While it is “not enough to properly endanger its recent rise”, it is “still a knock to any momentum the index had been building this week”, said Connor Campbell, financial analyst at Spreadex.
“What makes the FTSE’s minor dip more interesting was that it came alongside another slip from sterling, which was down 0.3% against the dollar and 0.1% against the euro,” Campbell added.
In the same way that concerns over vaccines and a third wave impacted the pound this week, concerns may now be spreading to the blue-chip index. “This in light of the WHO’s warning on Thursday that it is the lockdown measures in place since Christmas, and not the vaccine rollout, that has supressed covid-19 cases in the UK – a worry given the recent easing, and daily case numbers that, whilst falling, still number in the thousands,” said Campbell.
The tone was similarly muted in the Eurozone. The DAX remained the wrong side of 15,200 as it fell 0.2%, with the CAC flat a few points short of 6,170.
The Dow Jones, on the other hand, is looking to add 50 or so points this afternoon, an increase that would lift it to 33,550, and put it back in all-time high territory.
FTSE 100 Top Movers
Spirax-Sarco Engineering (2.34%), Compass Group (1.87%) and JD Sports (1.82%) are the top risers on early morning trading as the week draws to a close.
British American Tobacco (-2.48%), BAE Systems (-2.41%) and Glencore (-1.94%) are the bottom end of the FTSE 100 so far on Friday.
