The UK’s housebuilders staged a rally on Wednesday morning but failed to spark a FTSE 100 rebound from weakness in prior sessions.

Barratt Developments was up over 5% in midmorning trade following the release of a positive trading update that highlighted strong forward sales. The FTSE 100 was down 0.3% to 7,108.

“Housebuilders enjoyed a boost from Barratt Development’s latest update, putting that stock at the top of the FTSE 100 risers and lifting Persimmon, Taylor Wimpey and Berkeley Group in the process,” said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bel

Taylor Wimpey, Persimmon and Berkeley Group were up between 2.5%-4% as investors jumped on the coat tails of Barratt’s update.

“Forward sales have been good at Barratt and the company remains upbeat. There had been some nervousness towards the housebuilding sector that it would be negatively impacted by ongoing inflation in raw material prices and more recently from elevated energy prices,” said Mould.

Markets remain nervous

“Equity markets look to have stabilised after a patchy showing earlier this week, however it does feel as though investors remain slightly nervous,” said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.

“The FTSE 100’s biggest fallers in index point terms were a mixture of defensive and cyclical stocks, so investors are clearly not falling on one side of the fence. Pharmaceuticals, consumer goods and miners were among the stocks in negative territory.

Iron ore is down around 10% over two days making the miners some of the worst performers on the day. Rio Tinto and BHP Group were big drags of the FTSE 100 down 2.6% and 1.9% respectively in early trade on Wednesday.

The FTSE 100 was negative for the second day in a row meaning the FTSE 100 has now formed as series of lower highs at 7185, 7160 and now 7148 which could signal technical weakness in the index.

Barratt Developments has said that it is confident in meeting targets for the year after steady demand over the past quarter.

Between 1 July and 10 October the group delivered 27 new developments and 281 net private reservations per week.

“This is particularly encouraging given the significant year on year reduction in Help to Buy reservations and the ending of the stamp duty holiday,” commented chief executive David Thomas.

“We continue to work closely with our suppliers and sub-contractors and have not experienced any significant disruption to our build programme as a result of the challenging supply chain environment.”

In a statement, Barratt said “The group is in a very good position. We have both a substantial net cash balance and strong forward sales, as well as an excellent land bank and a continued focus on delivering operational improvements across our business, alongside our ongoing commitment to deliver high quality, sustainable homes across the country.”

Laura Hoy, Equity Analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, commented: “The housebuilders have found themselves in somewhat of a sweet spot. While pent-up lockdown demand is starting to wane, people are still motivated to move and that’s driven house prices higher. According to Barratt, that’s been enough to offset build cost inflation, and the group’s not expecting to deliver any downside surprises this year.”

Analysts also pointed to Barratt largely shacking off the impact of the end of stamp duty holidays and changes to Help to Buy.

“Shareholders in housebuilders have been looking on nervously, as the stamp duty land tax break has ended and the rules for Help to Buy continued to change but Barratt’s trading statement offers welcome reassurance,” said AJ Bell Investment Director Russ Mould.

“The net reservations rate in its new financial year may have dipped slightly compared to 2020 but it has exceeded the level seen at this stage in 2019 by 18%, even though Help to Buy has represented only a fifth of house purchases compared to more than half in the first three months of the last financial year (and just under 40% for the year as a whole).

Marston’s sales tumbled 22% this year as lockdown restrictions hit the business.

The pub group sales stood at £402m and the 1,500 pubs were only open for just over half of trading days for the year ending in October.

Since April, the group has been trading at 94% of pre-pandemic levels, resulting in the groups’ chief executive to say that they were “encouraged by the trading momentum which we have experienced since April and pleased to be trading robustly and above 2019 levels again.”

“Our business benefits from an optimally balanced pub estate of food and wet led pubs that are predominately suburban, community-based and well located for the changes in consumer behaviour that we are seeing,” said Andrew Andrea.

Marston’s share price remained flat on the trading update.

The UK economy was up by 0.4% in August but GDP still remains 0.8% below pre-pandemic levels .

The service industry was up by 0.3% whilst manufacturing was up by 0.5%. The economy in the three months to August grew by 2.9%, which is lower than forecasts of 3%.

New data from the Office of National Statistics found that hotels and restaurants picked up by 10.3% as people socialised more and were getting ‘pinged’ less.

“The improvement in August probably had a lot to do with the fading of the restraint from July’s “pingdemic”, which at one point meant more than 1m people were self-isolating,” said Paul Dales, chief UK economist at Capital Economics.

“And the recent broadening in shortages and the fuel crisis may mean that growth has come to a near-standstill since August.”

Transport also picked up in August, however, still remains below pre-pandemic levels. Air travel, for example, was up 27.5% in August thanks to relaxed restrictions. It is still 75% below pre-pandemic levels.

EasyJet has seen a 400% surge in bookings over the Christmas period as travel restrictions relax.

Despite the recovery, the company said it expects a £1.1bn pretax loss for the year and hopes to fly 70% of pre-pandemic levels this quarter.

“It is clear recovery is underway. Business travel is returning to easyJet with corporates and SMEs attracted by our value, network and approach to sustainability,” said Johan Lundgren, chief executive.

“We have seen city breaks beginning to return alongside growing demand for leisure travel from customers looking for flights and holidays to popular winter sun destinations including Egypt and Turkey.”

The group has added 100,000 seats to destinations including Egypt, Turkey and the Canary Islands, which have been popular this autumn.

Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, commented: “Finally, the dark clouds are parting and are letting some bright light in. Restrictions are being eased, rules simplified, and travellers are regaining their appetite to fly once again.

“EasyJet has declared ‘the recovery is underway’, with losses narrowing and strong enough bookings to warrant increasing capacity for the last three months of 2021.

“That’s helped by decent demand for a week in the sun during the October half-term, with individuals eager to get a slice of sea and sun that many were denied this summer and last year.”