UK Home Prices Drop, IMF Approves $1.15 B to Ireland

Arthi Gupta
06 Sep, 2012
New York City

The UK indexes soared after the ECB announced a plan to buy unlimited government bonds. The IMF agreed to disburse $1.15 billion to Ireland. UK home prices declined in August. Whitbread jumped 6% after second quarter sales increased 15%.

[R]4:30 PM London – The UK indexes soared after the ECB announced a plan to buy unlimited government bonds. The IMF agreed to disburse $1.15 billion to Ireland. UK home prices declined in August. Whitbread jumped 6% after second quarter sales increased 15%.[/R]

The UK indexes soared after the European Central Bank President Mario Draghi announced a plan to buy unlimited government bonds.

The widely anticipated move is expected to keep the yields of Spanish and Italian bonds lower and help struggling nations to refinance the debt at a manageable cost.

The European Central Bank held its main refinancing rate at 0.75%, the deposit rate at zero and the marginal lending facility rate at 1.5% in the Governing Council meeting in Frankfurt today.

Separately, the Bank of England policymakers maintained the quantitative easing program at £375 billion and also left the key rate unchanged at 0.5%, as expected by most economists.

In London, the benchmark index FTSE 100 soared 125.04 or 2.2% to 5,782.53 and the pound edged lower to $1.5899.

IMF Approves $1.15 B Disbursement to Ireland

The International Monetary Fund agreed to disburse $1.15 billion to Ireland, as part of a financing package of $106.91 billion approved on December 16, 2010.

So far Ireland has received $24.02 billion from the IMF.

UK Home Prices Drop

UK home prices declined in August, according to a report released by the Lloyds Banking Group''s Halifax division today.

Home prices fell 0.4% in August, the second successive monthly fall, from a 0.7% drop in July. Prices in the three months to August were 0.9% lower than in the same period a year earlier.

Home prices at £160,256 were at a very similar level to three years'' ago.

UK Car Sales Improve

Registrations of new passenger cars in the United Kingdom increased 0.1% from last year to 59,433 units in August, data released by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders showed.

In the January-August period, overall new car sales increased 3.3% from the corresponding period last year.

Gainers & Losers

Costain Group Plc rose 0.7% to 245.75_ pence after the engineering contractor said Magnox has awarded a framework contract worth around £288 million on behalf of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority.

Dixons Retail plc climbed 2.2% to 19.52 pence after the electrical retailer said total sales rose 2% and comparable sales increased 5% in the first quarter. Gross margins decreased 0.3% in the first quarter.

easyJet plc gained 3.1% to 561 pence after the low-cost airline said total number of passengers for the month increased 6% to 5.87 million from 5.54 million in the previous year. Load factor for August was 91.7 percent, down from 92.2% a year ago.

Jazz Pharmaceuticals plc gained 0.2% to $45.04 after the biopharmaceutical company agreed to sell its women''s health business, including six products, to Meda for $95 million cash.

Shire Plc advanced 1.7% to 1,975 pence after the biopharmaceutical company announced that its subsidiary settled all pending litigation with Anchen Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and Anchen, Inc. and TWi Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Spirent Communications plc increased 2.1% to 159.30 pence after the communications technology company agreed to acquire Metrico Wireless Inc. for $52 million.

Whitbread Plc soared 5.8% to 2,221 pence after the hotel and restaurants operator group reported second quarter sales increased 14.8% on 4.2% comparable sales growth.