Weekly review
The FTSE 100 ended the week down 9.84 points at 7,622.40.
Equity view
British American Tobacco has welcomed the US Food and Drug Administration’s new guidance on vaping products.
Fashion retailer Next raised full year profit guidance as a colder November and improved stock availability provided a boost for sales over the Christmas period.
Bovis Homes Group has completed the acquisition of Galliford Try’s Linden Homes and Partnerships & Regeneration businesses, it confirmed on Friday.
Artificial intelligence-enabled kidney disease clinical diagnostics technology company Renalytix AI announced on Friday that the United States national price for its ‘KidneyIntelX’ product, set by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), became effective on 1 January.
Financial technology-focussed investment company Augmentum Fintech has made a £7.5m investment into UK-based digital bookkeeping platform provider Receipt Bank, it announced on Friday.
Apple has inked a new supply deal with Imagination Technologies for its graphics processing units.
Building materials firm CRH appointed Richie Boucher to the role of chairman on Thursday, taking over from former chair Nicky Hartery.
Tullow Oil said its Carapa-1 exploration well offshore Guyana had discovered oil, although lower than pre-drilling estimates.
Restaurant owner and operator Tasty said on Thursday that it was on track to meet market expectations for the year as it announced the disposal of its More London site for £2m in cash.
Intellectual property-based business developer IP Group said on Thursday that its portfolio company Oxford Nanopore Technologies has raised £29.3m of new capital, and facilitated the secondary sale of £80.2m of shares, for an aggregate investment of £109.5 million.
CLS Holdings announced the sale of a portfolio of 19 regional offices in the UK for an aggregate cash consideration of £65m to Singaporean investment firm Elite Capital Partners on Monday.
Mobile commerce company Bango updated the market on its expected financial performance for the 2019 financial year on Tuesday, reporting that end user spend for the year was expected to be around £1.1bn, continuing its five-year trend of doubling growth in that measure each year.
Urban Exposure updated the market on its lending on Tuesday, reporting that it had completed new committed lending of £498m during the year ending 31 December.
Petrofac announced a new contract and the award of an additional scope of work with Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) on Tuesday, with a combined value of around $130m.
Arc Minerals has entered into definitive agreements with a consortium of French and Swedish institutional and high net worth investors, it announced on Tuesday, to raise approximately $1.7m through the issue of unsecured convertible loan notes.
AstraZeneca announced on Monday, alongside its partner MSD, that ‘Lynparza’, or olaparib, has been approved in the United States for the maintenance treatment of adult patients with deleterious or suspected deleterious germline BRCA-mutated (gBRCAm) metastatic pancreatic adenocarcinoma, or pancreatic cancer, whose disease had not progressed on at least 16 weeks of a first-line platinum-based chemotherapy regimen.
Rio Tinto has started the process of resuming operations at Richards Bay Minerals (RBM) in South Africa, it announced on Monday.
Countrywide confirmed on Monday that its share consolidation had now become effective.
Radio frequency networks provider Cyanconnode received an order for 33,000 units from its distributor and technology partner in Thailand on Monday.
Focusrite confirmed on Monday that it has drawn down its new loan, and completed the acquisition of Martin Audio and associated companies.
Economic news
Annual UK house price growth topped 1% in December for the first time in 12 months, according to a survey by Nationwide, as a healthy labour market helped to offset economic uncertainty.
Government gas and electricity market regulator Ofgem has ordered firms pay £10.5m as a result of the power cuts of 9 August that impacted more than one million consumers.
UK manufacturing output fell in December at its fastest pace in almost seven-and-a-half years, according to data released on Thursday.
Train operating company Northern was faced with its most serious threat yet from Westminster on Thursday - that it could lose its franchise.
UK bakery chain Greggs has launched its new vegan steak bake in a move to expand its meat-free range.
The Treasury has announced the largest ever cash increase in the National Living Wage as the government moves to deliver on its promise to raise living standards as the UK exits the European Union.
The UK’s ambitious plans to develop a next generation stealth fighter jet will be sped up next year as the firms involved step up their recruitment efforts.
Bank of England governor Mark Carney said all companies and financial institutions must justify their investment in fossil fuels and advised firms to cut down on them as assets in the sector could end up “worthless”.
Optimism among small UK businesses plumbed an eight-year low in 2019 in the fourth quarter with Brexit, political uncertainty and slow growth all taking their toll, revealed a study on Monday.
UK high streets lost over 140,000 jobs in 2019 amid mass store closings among retailers, revealed the latest study from the Centre for Retail Research.
International events
Oil prices spiked to their highest level in four months on Friday after the US assassinated Iranian military commander General Qasem Soleimani.
The number of people out of work in Germany rose more than expected in December, according to figures released by Destatis on Friday, but the unemployment rate was steady.
Former Renault-Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn is set to talk to Beirut media next Wednesday to give his account of how he managed to flee Japan just months before he was set to stand trial on charges of financial misconduct.
Activity levels in the single currency bloc's manufacturing sector hit seven year-lows at the tail-end of 2019, with output falling at its fastest pace since 2012, although the slowdown was not quite as bad as initially feared, revised data showed.
China’s central bank said on Wednesday that it will cut the required reserve ratio for commercial lenders by 50 basis points from 6 January to help bolster the slowing economy.
Beijing has temporarily suspended the Shanghai-London Stock Connect due to the tensions with Westminster over the situation in Hong Kong.
China's manufacturing sector continued to expand at a steady pace at the end of 2019 with a gauge linked to new export orders revealing the first signs of growth since mid-2018.
A closely-followed lead indicator for activity in the US housing sector picked up more slowly than anticipated last month.
A slump in factory sector activity around the Chicago area eased more than expected at the end of the year, the results of a closely-followed survey revealed.
A top Chinese diplomat said Beijing would honour its commitments under the phase one trade deal that was soon to be signed between Beijing and Washington, even as he criticised talk of a new Cold War as "very irresponsible".