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News Headlines:    In the US increasing worry about rising interest depressed the markets in early trading but a steady rally pushed the DOW positive by the close Over the last 15 years, August has been the worst month for the Dow industrials and the S&P 500, while September has been the second worst

Royal Bank of Scotland Britain's second-biggest bank said that first-half pre-tax profit rose 10% with a 31% increase in earnings. Pre-tax profit increased to 3.45 billion pounds from 3.15 billion pounds a year earlier. Revenues rose to 9.08 billion pounds

BOC Group reported a better-than-expected three percent fall in third quarter profits on Tuesday, and said it saw no consistent signs of an upturn in semiconductor investment. Profit for the three months to June 30 fell to 115.2 million pounds from 119 million last year. Analysts forecasts ranged from 105 to 114 million.Lastminute.com reported a profit in the third quarter on Tuesday and said summer bookings for the the key fourth quarter had started strongly. They reported earnings in the three months to end-June of 4.1 million pounds against a loss of 1.9 million pounds a year earlier.

Burberry Group said its Chief Operating and Financial Officer Michael Metcalf would step down at the end of March, 2004.

Bellway housebuilder said that demand for its homes had been robust, and that its forward order book was worth 380 million pounds up 17 percent from a year ago.

Calendar All GMT	United Kingdom (F)inals (I)nterim	United States (Click Flag)	Europe & World
Tue 5th	BOC Group (Q3) PBT 105m exp.Royal Bank of Scotland (I) PBT 3,400m exp, Ryanair (Q1), Enodis (Q3), Lastminute.com (Q3), nCipher (I), Sherwood International (I) 09.30 July CIPS Services PMI 55.0 exp. : Cisco Systems (Q2) 09.30 June Indtrial Production m/m 0.1% exp. 09.30 June Manufacturing Production m/m 0.2% exp.	15.00  July Non-Manufacturing ISM 58.0 exp.	Clariant (I), Pernod Ricard (Q2) 09.00  July BME Services PMI 48.7 11.00  May Retail Trade m/m 0.5% exp.
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