Heavyweight stocks lift Footsie from losing streak

HEAVYWEIGHT oil and financial stocks pushed forward yesterday to help the FTSE 100 Index end an eight-day losing streak.

A tentatively upbeat start on Wall Street further lifted trading, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average and tech-laden Nasdaq both up by London’s close.

That contradicted traders’ forecasts of a flat opening and helped spur on the FTSE 100 to close 49.9 points ahead at 3974.9.

Following a strong November, the FTSE 100 has been stuck in a downbeat lull and yesterday’s gains were welcomed by investors.

Heavyweights stocks supporting trading included oil giants, which moved up on hopes Thursday’s OPEC meeting would curb output levels.

That would buoy the price of crude, as would potential supply problems in Venezuela, and BP and Shell added 5p at 419p and 3.25p at 396.26p respectively.

Among financial stocks, Alliance & Leicester set the tone with a climb of 12p to 778.5p on an upbeat trading update.

The sector has taken a battering over recent weeks, predominately on bad debt worries and weak updates from Barclays and Lloyds TSB.

Lloyds lost early gains to close 2.5p lower to 463.5p but Barclays was ahead a penny at 391.75p, Standard Chartered added 26p at 740.5p and Royal Bank of Scotland was up 42p at 1520p.

Fund manager Schroders gained 18.5p at 516.5p while insurer Royal & Sun Alliance added 7.75p at 133.5p.