ANOTHER strong opening on Wall Street gave a lift to share prices in London yesterday, helping the market to shake off the effect of some disappointing figures from Shell Transport.
The FTSE-100 index climbed back towards the middle of the 3650-3850 range, where it has fluctuated for much of 1996. By the close, Footsie had risen 31.2 points to 3734.4.
It looked like being a different picture in mid-morning, when Footsie briefly touched a low for the day of 3697.7, down 5.5 points. The warnings from Shell about weak demand in the chemicals sector was coupled with news of retrenchment at Hanson's SCM chemicals subsidiary at its worst, the fall in Shell, down 25 1/2 at one point, had knocked five points off the index.
However, the London market has been dominated this week by events on Wall Street, where a series of economic data has given clues about the possibility of an interest rate rise when the Federal Reserve's open market committee meets on August 20th.
The medium-sized stocks failed once again to keep up with the leaders, with the FTSE Mid-250 index up just 12.4 to 4243.0.
At home, the British purchasing managers' index, the month's first economic indicator, showed a continuing pick up in manufacturing activity, which had been in the doldrums during the first half.
With the price element of the purchasing managers' survey subdued, and with international bonds delivering, gilts performed.
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