A SURPRISE fall in the rate of unemployment in the US gave London stocks a shot in the arm today.
Figures revealed that just 11,000 jobs were axed during November in America, far less than the 130,000 predicted and a drastic fall on the revised figures for the previous month.
The FTSE 100 Index responded by reversing earlier losses into a 60-point gain, although it later pared this back to close 9.4 points higher at 5322.4.
On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had fallen nearly 90 points overnight amid caution over today’s jobs data.
But the better than expected news saw the Dow shake off the previous day’s declines.
London’s leading blue chip gainer was British Airways, up 5.8p at 212p, or 2.8%.
The carrier was benefiting from a broker upgrade as Citigroup changed its recommendation from hold to buy, while its shares also climbed following low-cost carrier easyJet’s report of a sharp rise in bookings.
Meanwhile, easyJet said passenger numbers rose by 12.2% to 3.35m in November, which gave the sector a fillip. The budget airline’s shares closed 9.8p higher at 390p following the update.
Banks were also back in the spotlight today as an official report revealed the level of public sector support had soared to £850bn since the start of the financial crisis.
The National Audit Office (NAO) report made for gloomy reading as it laid bare the full scale of the drag on the public purse.
Part-nationalised Lloyds Banking Group had earlier led declines as blue-chip banks gave back gains seen in the previous session.
They were also hit by a lukewarm broker note from JP Morgan, but the cheery US jobs news helped Lloyds see a turnaround in its fortunes, ending the day up 0.55p up at 56p.
Standard Chartered remained in the red, with shares down 4%, or 57p to 1513p.
Royal Bank of Scotland also remained in negative territory amid reports that it is expected to pay its investment bankers substantially less than rival institutions after bowing to Government pressure. RBS shares were off 0.50p at 34.63p.
Primark parent Associated British Foods was another stock on the rise, ahead 12p at 812p, after reassuring that trading results for the first two months of the new financial year were ahead of its expectations and as it voiced confidence in growing full-year profits.
However, housebuilders were out of favour in the FTSE 250 after updates from Berkeley Group and Bellway.
The pair were down despite improved trading as investors focused on their caution over the state of the property market. Berkeley fell 16p to 876p, while Bellway dropped 6p to 758p.
The biggest Footsie risers were British Airways ahead 5.8p at 212p, AstraZeneca up 71p at 2843p, Sage Group up 5.5p at 230.8p and GlaxoSmithKline up 28.5p at 1311.5p.
The biggest Footsie fallers were Randgold Resources down 222p at 4973p, Standard Chartered off 57p at 1513p, Xstrata down 38p at 1066p and Lonmin down 48p at 1809p.
