A FRESH burst of takeover activity, plus the latest searing performance from Wall Street overnight - the Dow posted its fifth straight record high - saw the FTSE 100 hit new intra day and closing peaks yesterday.
Wall Street gave another powerful demonstration at the start of trading yesterday, hitting yet another record not long after London closed.
The index failed by only four points to penetrate the 4,800 level, eventually finishing 25.7 up at a closing record of 4,783.1, up 138.1 or over 3 per cent on the week.
And there was more market boosting news from the US yesterday when May producer prices fell 0.3 per cent on the month, against a consensus forecast of a 0.1 per cent increase.
The PPI data rounded off a week of excellent US economic news, which has seen Wall Street and London hurtle to new records.
Wall Street has been lifted by the recent lower than expected employment report for May and a fall in retail sales, all of which are seen as sharply reducing the possibility of a US rate rise when the Federal Reserve's Open Market Committee meets on July 2nd.
Demand for British stocks encompassed the recently underperforming secondliners and small cap stocks. The FTSE 250, which has begun to show signs of outpacing the FTSE 100 over recent sessions, ran up 40.9 to 4,586.1, for a 112.9 point or 2.5 per cent gain on the week.
It was helped substantially by a takeover approach for one of its constituents, the food processing group Albert Fisher.
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