Saga enjoys 'good' first quarter, White elevated to Barratt finance chief

London open

The FTSE 100 is expected to open eight points lower on Thursday, after closing down 0.33% at 7,447.79 on Wednesday.

Stocks to watch

Saga, the provider of products for the over-50s, said its insurance and travels business had enjoyed a "good" first quarter as it begins a major transition to a new business model. Ahead of its annual shareholder meeting, the FTSE 250 company said the insurance and travel businesses "continued their good start to the year" during the period from 1 February to 21 June, despite citing the backdrop of changing political and economic environment.

Barratt Developments announced that Jessica White was joining the board of the company on Thursday, as an executive director and chief financial officer, with immediate effect. The FTSE 100 housebuilder said White, currently Barratt's group financial controller, has “extensive experience” in the housebuilding sector, having joined Wilson Bowden as a corporate accountant in 2005.

Newspaper round-up

The price of British strawberries could rise by more than a third if the UK cannot ensure access to European workers after Brexit, farmers have warned. Producers have called on the government to introduce a permit scheme for seasonal workers to ensure that the expansion of soft fruit production in the UK is not brought to a halt. – Guardian

Advertisers will pull hundreds of millions of pounds in spending from Google and Facebook this year over concerns about ads running next to inappropriate content such as extremist sites and fake news. Sir Martin Sorrell’s GroupM, which buys more than $75bn (£60bn) of advertising space on behalf of clients globally, has slashed its growth prediction for UK digital advertising and has blamed some of the adjustment on an advertiser backlash over the inability of Silicon Valley giants to stop ads appearing around inappropriate content. – Guardian

Drinks giant Diageo has agreed to pay up to $1bn to down George Clooney’s tequila company. The group behind Johnnie Walker and Smirnoff made its offer just four years after Casamigos, or ‘house of friends’, was founded by the US actor alongside Cindy Crawford’s husband Rande Gerber and real estate developer Mike Meldman. - Telegraph

The Serious Fraud Office appears to have been granted a reprieve from plans to abolish it in a U-turn that came just a day after the organisation targeted Barclays with the first criminal charges ever brought against a bank over the financial crisis. Controversial proposals in the Conservative manifesto to fold the SFO into the National Crime Agency were quietly dropped from the Queen’s Speech on Wednesday. – Telegraph

One of Britain’s leading businessmen will warn today that a cap on immigration will have a “materially detrimental effect on the UK economy”. John Allan, chairman of Tesco and Barratt Developments, the housebuilder, will tell the annual lunch of London First, the lobby group: “If we have an over-restrictive immigration policy we are going to drive the economy down. That will be bad for everyone. It will lead to fewer jobs and decreasing real wages.” – The Times

The failed employment agency embroiled in the pay and conditions row at a Sports Direct warehouse has left the taxpayer with a £8.2 million bill, according to an administrator’s report. The largest unsecured creditor of Qualitycourse, the company behind Transline, is set to be HM Revenue & Customs, which is owed income tax, national insurance and VAT, Deloitte said. – The Times

US close

Wall Street’s main market indices finished Wednesday on a mixed note, despite the release of data showing another drop in oil inventories and stronger-than-expected demand for new homes.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended down 0.27% at 21,410.03, while the S&P 500 lost 0.06% to 2,435.61 and the Nasdaq 100 finished 0.98% higher at 5,782.39.

Commercial US oil inventories declined by 2.5m barrels in the week ending 16 June to reach 509.1m, according to the Department of Energy, which was more than the 2.0m drop projected by analysts.

WTI prices hit a nine-month low during the previous session, entering bear-market territory after having declined by over 20% from their most recent peak.