London’s stock market experienced a downturn on Friday, primarily influenced by a decline in domestic retail sales and a drop in commodity prices.
FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 Performance
FTSE 100: The blue-chip index fell by 0.6%, indicating a likely end-of-week decline.
FTSE 250: The mid-cap index also decreased by 0.6% as of 0730 GMT.
Sector-Specific Declines
Precious Metal Miners: The sector faced significant pressure with a 2.5% drop. Fresnillo (LON:FRES) saw a notable 5.4% decline, reflecting the downward trend in spot gold prices, which fell by more than 1%.
Industrial Metal Miners: This sector was down 1.9% due to copper prices hitting a three-month low, exacerbated by the lack of Chinese stimulus measures.
Aerospace and Defence Stocks: In contrast, this sector recorded a modest gain of 0.2%. This uptick came after British defence executives, including BAE and Babcock, met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to discuss increasing military support for Ukraine amid its ongoing conflict with Russia.
Retail Sales and Economic Indicators
Retail Sales: Domestic retail sales fell by 1.2% in June, surpassing the anticipated 0.4% decline. This drop influenced market expectations for a potential August interest rate cut, with bets rising to 43% from around 39% the previous day.
Inflation and Wage Growth: Recent data indicated slowing wage growth and inflation meeting the Bank of England’s 2% target.
Stock Movements
Personal Goods and Retail Stocks: These sectors experienced declines of 2.8% and 0.6%, respectively.
Hargreaves Lansdown: Despite strong growth in new customers and net new business for Q4, shares fell by 1%.
LSEG Group: Shares trended lower after an outage on its Workspace news and data platform affected global user access.
Looking Ahead
Next week’s focus will shift to corporate earnings reports from the U.S. and the U.K. Additionally, U.S. inflation data will be closely watched as it will play a crucial role in the Federal Reserve’s upcoming rate cut decision.
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