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CFD Traders DiaryPlenty of poor economic news around but quiet conditions9/4/2008 After all the focus on the US recently, there has been a fair amount of bad news feeding through on the UK economy, which has kept shares very quiet this morning. The IMF has now sharply reduced its UK growth forecasts and the statistics are beginning to hark back to the last recession in the early 1990s. It looks as though Alastair Darling's growth forecasts are looking hopelessly over optimistic, with the UK potentially seeing GDP growth of just 1.6% this year and next. When added to the big falls now being seen in house price surveys, there is no doubt that the UK consumer will be under pressure and we are seeing falls in retailers this morning. Against that though it looks as though interest rates will have to come down and this has provided some respite to the housebuilding sector which has again been under pressure in recent days. There was also an interesting story that HSBC was making a push to gain market share in the UK mortgage market by offering to match any current fixed rate mortgage deal that is coming to an end added to the unease over the sector. This looks highly opportunistic and no doubt there will be plenty of caveats, but it does show that all is not quite doom and gloom. Elsewhere, Mitchells & Butlers saw some early support after it reported like-for-like sales were up 0.6% in the 27 weeks to 5th April. Food sales were the star and now account for 38% of sales with same outlet like-for-like sales growth up 4.8%. Given the resilient forecast for the rest of the year, the rise so far of 2.7% looks reasonable, but investors should be cautious as the saga of its on/off merger talks continues |
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