Monday saw the UK markets hang onto the US coat tails and both the FTSE 100 and FTSE TechMARK closed up by 1% and 0.8% respectively. Sectors in favour today were banks, oil, media, telecommunications, and at least one insurer.
Tuesday saw the UK markets work against Wall Street and close with gains. The usual players made it happen, leaving the FTSE 100 up by almost 1% and the TechMARK up over 1%. Wall Street had fallen back due to worse than expected consumer confidence figures.
Wednesday was, once again, helped by a more positive outlook in the US, despite closing falls for the Nasdaq. The FTSE 100 closed up by almost 1% for the day, fuelled by turnaround gains from Vodafone. This was despite a fall back in the financials sector. The clear winner for the day was the TechMARK, closing up by over 2%. Despite a poor final close on the Nasdaq in the US (after UK markets had closed), UK technology stocks kept going for the gains and three days of positive closes.
Thursday put an end to the positive closes in the UK and yesterday's slight fall backs were extended in the financials, drugs and telecommunications sectors. By close of play, the FTSE 100 had lost 1.5% and the TechMARK lost over 3%. It wasn't all bad news though, during the day's trading, UK markets did come back, helped along by news from the US that the economy had grown more than expected.
Friday saw some of the financials make a welcome comeback, to leave the FTSE 100 with an overall gain of almost 2.5% for the week and almost 1.5% for the day. The TechMARK ended the day up over 1% and managed over 2% for the week. More good news from the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply the UK's manufacturing sector has grown for the first time in 12 months. Does this mean that the Bank Of England will raise interest rates?