This Morning in London major shares were higher in opening deals after the long-awaited Santa rally finally arrived Friday. At 9:10 the FTSE-100 was 25.9 points firmer at 6,460, having ended 88.5 points higher on Friday. All the broader FTSE indices were also higher apart from the FTSE Smallcaps.
BROKER RECOMMENDATIONS
ABN says hold AMEC (AMEC) (raising the target price to 840p from 730p).
UBS has reiterated neutral on Carpetright (CPR) (following the termination of bid discussions), with a 1200p target price and says buy EMAP (EMA) (with a 950p target price), following the offer.
NEWS ROUND-UP
Last Friday in New York investors were heard singing, “We wish you a merry Christmas”, as shares rallied to record strong weekly gains, following upbeat results from Research In Motion, which boosted the technology sector, with financials gaining strength on news that Merrill Lynch might draw a large investment from overseas. The Dow closed up 205.01-points at 13450.65, the Nasdaq 51.13-points to 2691.99, while the S&P closed at 1484.48, a rise of 24.34-points. On the week the Dow Jones was up 0.8%, the Nasdaq 2.1%, while S&P put on 1.2%.
On this day:-
1650 - Edinburgh Castle in Scotland surrendered to troops commanded by Oliver Cromwell.
1798 - Great Britain and Russia signed a military alliance against France.
1800 - A plot to assassinate Napoleon Bonaparte was discovered in Paris. The ringleaders were arrested and deported to Guiana.
1814 - America and Great Britain signed the Treaty of Ghent, officially ending the War of 1812.
1818 - Franz Xavier Gruber wrote the Christmas carol, Silent Night.
1865 - In America, the formation of the White Supremacist group, the Klu Klux Klan.
1871 - Verdi's opera Aida had its world premiere in Cairo.
1904 - The official opening of the London Coliseum in St Martin's Lane.
1914 - World War I: The first German air raid on Great Britain, a single bomb landed in the grounds of a church in Dover.
1942 - The French administrator of North Africa, Admiral Jean Darlan, was assassinated in Algiers.
1951 - Libya gained its independence as the United Kingdom of Libya.
1965 - A meteorite, weighing about 45 kilogrammes, landed in Leicestershire.
1967 - China conducted its seventh nuclear test.
1968 - Astronauts orbit moon. The United States space capsule Apollo 8, the first manned mission to the moon, entered lunar orbit. During the Apollo's ten orbits of the moon, television images and spectacular photos were taken of Earth and the moon. In addition to being the first human beings to view their home world in its entirety, American astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders were also the first to actually see the dark side of the moon. On Christmas morning, Apollo 8 left its lunar orbit and began its journey back to Earth, landing safely in the Pacific Ocean on 27th December. On 20th July of the next year, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, astronauts of the Apollo 11 mission, became the first men to walk on the moon.
1979 - Soviet troops invaded Afghanistan.
1989 - General Manuel Antonio Noriega took refuge in the Vatican diplomatic mission in Panama City, as resistance from remaining loyalist troops collapsed.
1990 - Iraq recalled its ambassadors to the United States, to the United Nations and to Western European countries, while refusing to withdraw its troops from Kuwait ahead of the 15th January 1991 deadline.
