Rally in tech stocks puts an end to a Red October
After suffering its worst month since August 2015, the
FTSE 100 ended October on a positive note.
Britain’s blue-chip index climbed by 1.3pc, or 92.25 points, to 7128.10 points. for October as a whole, the index still lost 382.1 points.
Most of the losses were racked up within the first two weeks. factors from US interest rate policy to its trade war with China to the Italian budget row were blamed for shaking investor confidence.
russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said: ‘the upturn is positive for investors.’
Across the pond, major tech stocks like Amazon and Netflix, which bore the brunt of October’s sell- off, continued their two- day rally. Amazon rose 4.1pc, Netflix climbed 6.8pc and Google’s parent, Alphabet, gained 3.9pc.
the tech giants had led the slide on Wall Street last month, leaving the S&P 500 and the Dow indexes with barely any gains for the year.
Middle east-focused hospital company NMC Health led the FTSE 100 risers after its senior independent director Jonathan Bomford bought £34,755 worth of shares for his pension.
His purchase priced the shares at 3475.5p, pushing them up 5.2pc, or 176p, to 3532p.
Mining giant Glencore also added its heft behind the FTSE 100’s rise as it outlined plans to achieve 50pc more cost savings in its coal business than it had previously predicted.
the titan is now set to save more than £353m per year.
the FTSE 250, meanwhile, will see the comeback of Neil Woodford’s Patient Capital Trust.
the investment fund will fill the gap left by electronic trading company NEX Group, which finally got the green light to merge with US-based CME Group and will be deleted from the FTSE 250.
the £700m trust invests savers’ money in a mixture of early-stage companies and well-known listed giants chosen by the widely-followed Woodford, and it will fill the gap on the FTSE 250 index from tomorrow.
It had previously been kicked out of the index in May this year, as its value had dwindled.
When the trust was ousted from the index, tracker funds which replicate the FTSE 250 were forced to sell around 30m of its shares, almost 4pc of the total.
Its return should see them buy back in, boosting its share price. Yesterday it was up by 5pc, or 4.2p, to 88p. It infrastructure firm Computacenter, which helps public and private sector businesses run their systems, crashed as sales slumped. revenue for the third quarter declined 3pc compared with last year to £900m.
Its re- selling business, which buys software from manufacturers and sells it to clients, saw revenues dip a weighty 5pc. Shares fell 12.6pc, or 158p, to 1098p. Anglo-German chipmaker Dialog Semiconductor impressed investors, despite its reliance on tech giant Apple.
Depending too heavily on the US iPad-maker has proved the undoing of other smaller tech firms. but in its third- quarter results, the frankfurt-listed business, which has operations in reading, saw revenue rise 6pc year-on-year, to £301m.
that prompted shares in the company to climb by 8.1pc, or 1.75 euros, to 23.26 euros.
Budget African airline Fastjet, rose by 23pc, or 0.54p, to 1.81p.
the struggling company said that it still had not agreed a new funding agreement with its shareholders.
fastjet announced in September that it wouldn’t be able to continue trading beyond October, but now believes it can carry on a little longer due to a slight improvement in its business.