9th Feb 2015 07:37
LONDON (Alliance News) - London markets set to open lower Monday, after Chinese trade data showed a sharp drop in imports for January, while miner Randgold Resources reported a drop in its full year profit and Rolls-Royce said it has signed three contracts worth up to USD442 million.
IG futures indicate the FTSE 100 to open 31 points lower at 6822.3. The index closed down 0.2% at 6,853.44 on Friday, with gold miners amongst the worst performing stocks after a better-than-expected US jobs report sent the dollar soaring and the gold price lower.
FTSE 100-listed miner Randgold said its full year pretax profit was USD353 million versus USD402.4 million in 2013. The company said fourth quarter profit was USD54 million versus USD66 million. The miner added that its fourth quarter gold sales were 284,048Oz versus 299,320Oz in the third quarter.
Rolls-Royce Holdings Monday said it has signed three contracts worth up to USD442 million to produce and support LiftSystems for the US's F-35B Lightning II aircraft.
The contracts cover low-rate initial production of 17 LiftSystems for the aircraft, along with support services, for two contract periods. It is a deal between Rolls-Royce and Pratt & Whitney, the propulsion provider for the F-35 programme.
Chinese imports plunged 19.9%, much faster than the 3.2% drop forecast by economists. In December, imports had decreased 2.4%. The decline, the fastest since May 2009, was driven by decreases in imports of coal,oil and commodities.
"This unexpected weakness is likely to increase the pressure on Chinese officials to implement further measures to ease policy further after last week?s triple R cut," says Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets.
In Europe, finance ministers from the euro area will hold an extraordinary meeting on February 11 to discuss the situation in Greece, Dutch Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem said on twitter late Friday.
Ministers will exchange their views on the future course of action on the Greek bailout, which is set to expire on February 28. On the following day, EU leaders including Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras will meet in Brussels.
At 0700 GMT, German 2014 current account surplus came in higher at EUR215.3 billion versus EUR189.2 billion year-on-year, while 2014 trade surplus rose to record a record high at EUR217 billion.
Wall Street ended mixed Friday. The DJIA closed down 0.3%, the S&P 500 ended down 0.3% and the Nasdaq Composite up 0.4%.
In Asia on Monday, the Japanese Nikkei 225 closed up 0.4% and the Hang Seng trades down 0.4%. The Shanghai Composite is trading up 0.6%.
Brent crude is quoted at around USD57.81 a barrel Monday, and US benchmark West Texas Intermediate is quoted at USD51.96 a barrel. Gold is quoted early Monday at USD1,238.60 an ounce.
In the economic calendar Monday, US Labor market conditions index for January is at 1500 GMT.
By Daniel Ruiz; [email protected]
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