Tuesday’s price action on the FTSE 350 was the mirror image of the prior session’s, with Leisure Goods and Software finding a bid, while mining and banks were on the backfoot.
Stocks overall however managed to advance further.
The key to that change of fortunes lay, at least in part, in government bond yields, which paused their rebound on both sides of the Atlantic, with analysts arguing that US Treasuries at least had become oversold.
As of 1953 GMT, the yield on the benchmark 10-year US Treasury note was down by six basis points to 1.54%, while that on similarly-dated Gilts had declined by three basis points to 0.73%.
Share prices were being influenced by company specific news as well however.
That was particularly true of Softcat – the leading IT reseller in the UK and Ireland – which bounded higher after Morgan Stanley started the shares at ‘overweight’.
The broker’s analysts cited indications from their industry contacts of a strong rebound in IT spend in the works once the pandemic had passed.
In the minus column, investors in the homebuilding space were keeping their powder dry ahead of a spate of upcoming risk events for the sector, including RICS’ Residential Survey (on Thursday) and a reading for January GDP (on Friday).#
Full-year results from Ibstock (on Wednesday) and a trading update from Berkeley Group (on Friday) were also in the pipeline.
Top performing sectors so far today
Leisure Goods 24,230.90 +6.35%
Industrial Engineering 15,341.04 +2.49%
Automobiles & Parts 4,816.01 +2.48%
Software & Computer Services 1,953.64 +2.35%
General Retailers 2,578.43 +2.26%
Bottom performing sectors so far today
Mining 24,463.42 -2.62%
Banks 2,923.67 -1.34%
Industrial Metals & Mining 5,921.62 -0.91%
Household Goods & Home Construction 17,698.78 -0.60%
Fixed Line Telecommunications 1,642.61 -0.34%
