London pre-open: Stocks set for early dip

Stocks are set for a modestly lower start to the last trading session of 2019, weighed down by another move higher in the pound and losses overnight on Wall Street as investors took profits following a year of torrid gains.

Futures on the FTSE 100 were down by 34.5 points at 7,501.50, while against the US dollar, the pound was ahead by 0.17% to 1.3131.

That was despite an unchanged reading on the 'official' China manufacturing sector Purchasing Managers' Index for December, which was unchanged from the month before at 50.2, albeit alongside the first positive reading for a sub-index linked to new orders since May 2018.

To take note of, also overnight the Treasury announced that the minimum wage in the UK was set to rise by 6.2% from 1 April.

Commenting on the previous day's price action in financial markets, Marshall Gittler at ACLS Global noted the weakness in the US dollar, but especially the fact that it fell the mosr against the Japanese yen and Swiss franc, leading him to conclude that it was a 'risk off' move.

"No doubt that’s related to the sea of red I see on my screens when I call up the stock market page – S&P 500 down 0.6% and most Asian markets down this morning too," he said.

"This is kind of surprising given that US trade advisor Navarro Monday said that a preliminary trade deal between the US and China is completed, and the South China Morning Post reported that it could be signed as early as this weekend.

"A surprisingly volatile market for this time of year – more substantial movement than I would’ve expected for the last active trading day of the year."

CLS sells office portfolio

CLS Holdings announced the sale of a portfolio of 19 regional offices in the UK for an aggregate cash consideration of £65m on Tuesday, to Singapore-based investment company Elite Capital Partners. The FTSE 250 firm said the offices are located across the UK outside of the south east and, following lease re-gears last year, had less active asset management potential. Following the completion of this transaction, CLS said it would hold only two assets in the UK located outside of the south east.

Mobile commerce company Bango updated the market on its expected financial performance for the 2019 financial year on Tuesday, reporting anticipated group revenue growth of over 40% to at least £9.3m. The AIM-traded firm said its total revenue would be below market expectations, mainly due to a customer data platform (CDP) license and marketplace supply deal not concluding in December as expected. It said its adjusted EBITDA for the full year was positive and expected to be more than £0.4m, which the board said would confirm the transition to cash generation.

Urban Exposure issued an update on its lending on Tuesday, reporting the completion of new committed lending of £498m during the year ending 31 December, it confirmed on Tuesday, and had now committed more than £1bn of new lending since admission to trading in May 2018. The firm said that a further £268m of loans were in the advanced stages of execution and were expected to close in the first quarter of 2020, having been delayed from closing in the fourth quarter of 2019 due to the impact of political and economic uncertainty. Due to the drawdown profile of those loans, the board said the impact of the delay on 2019 revenue was expected to be negligible.