Insurance Companies Strong on "Triple Witching" Day

Dominic Turner
shareprices.com - Monday, June 22, 2009

Options and futures traders should, therefore, have been delighted that signs of an economic recovery on both sides of the Atlantic lifted the FTSE 100 index during early trading. Better than expected manufacturing and employment data from the U.S. helped to lift New York equities, overnight, and gains were reflected in London, with the blue chip index up 75 points, or 1.75%, at 4,355.81, by midday.

Insurance companies, including Aviva, Friends Provident, Prudential and Standard Life, were amongst the best performers, after Deutsche Bank published a review of the European insurance sector. The review concluded that the sector was "good value", and Deutsche Bank upgraded to price target for several stocks. One of those, Aviva, whose price target was raised to 385p from 350p, rose 4.95%, to 334p, on Friday morning. Share prices in Prudential, too, rose 4.4%, to 423p, after it confirmed the sale of its agency business in Taiwan to Chinese Life Insurance Company, a move that will add a further £800 million to its £2 billion capital surplus.

Elsewhere, improved economic data from the U.S., and continuing concerns over supply in Nigeria, helped to push the price of crude oil back up towards $72 a barrel, while gold remained flat, at $934 a troy ounce, in the face of unusually low seasonal demand for jewellery in India.