Financial Stocks Lift FTSE

Unemployment in the UK may have fallen 3,000 to 2.46 million in the final quarter of 2009 according to figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), but the news was not all good, with the number of people claiming Jobseeker's Allowance rising by 23,500 to 1.64 million, the highest level since April, 1997, in January.

Dominic Turner
shareprices.com - Wednesday, February 17, 2010

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Man Group

As far as share prices were concerned financial stocks dominated the day helping to lift the FTSE 100 index to 5,276.64, up 33 points, at the close. Hedge fund manager Man Group was all the rage all day, eventually closing up 5.2% at 239.6p making it the best performer in the top tier, after persistent speculation that it is a takeover target for Blackrock Inc.

Outside the financial sector, Rexam, one of the top five consumer packaging companies in the world was a faller closing down 5p or 1.77% at 277p, after reporting slightly worse than expected full-year figures. Underlying pre-tax profits fell by 13% to £285 million in 2009, compared with 2008, although sales last year rose slightly to £4.87 from £4.62 million the year before, mainly as a result of favourable exchange rates.

Rexam reported that it had reduced its net debt to £1.8 billion and was confident of an improvement in performance during 2010. Rexam Chief Executive Graham Chipchase was certainly optimistic about the outlook for the firm; he was quoted in a Rexam press release, saying, "Trading conditions were difficult throughout 2009. However, we produced a strong cash performance, our cost reduction programme is ahead of plan and we delivered record efficiencies."

 

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