Footsie braced for index expiries

THERE was something for everyone in a British stock market positively with excitement yesterday, with the FT-SE 100 index powering ahead to an all-time intra-day record and then coming off sharply in sympathy with Wall Street.

At the close of trading, the FT-SE 100 index was 18.6 firmer at 3,974.3. The FT-SE Mid-250, however, was left well behind, and down 6.1 at 4,427.5, with investors concentrating their firepower on the leaders.

And there is bound to be more frantic activity this morning when the expiry of a series of derivatives instruments takes place shortly after 10 a.m.

Those expiries are part of a global series which involve European bourses and the US; the latter are viewed as having the potential to cause substantial waves in global markets.

But London dealers expect the expiry of the FT-SE 100 futures and index options to produce some violent movements in individual prices and indices.

Many dealers said the market would want to pin the FT-SE 100 future expiry at a big figure, with 4,000 the favourite. After the expiries, however, there is the potential for a sizeable sell-off.

While the market was preoccupied with speculation about the expiries, Footsie surged higher, piercing its previous intra-day peak shortly after noon and coming within 13 points of 4,000.

The driving forces behind the market's mid-morning gallop included a sudden ferocious burst of takeover speculation in Zeneca, the drugs group demerged from ICI three years ago.