Hello traders!

US stocks ended higher tonight as a more than 7% jump in shares of General Motors helped the Dow close above 11,000 for the first time in 4 1/2-year years.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 52 points at an unofficial close of 11,011. This would mark the first time since June 7th 2001 that the Dow has closed above 11,000. The Nasdaq Composite rose 13 points to 2,318.69 while the S&P500 climbed 4.6 points to 1,290.05.

See you in the morning with updates......

G.

Good morning traders!

In Asia today, the Nikkei has closed down 303.86 points at 16,124.35, hit by profit-taking, while the Hang Seng ended the morning up 109.64 points at 15,657.07.

Oil weakened overnight with New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in February, off 24 cents to $63.26 a barrel from its close of $63.50 in the US.

Early broker notes:

ULSTER TV UPGRADED TO 'BUY' VS 'ADD' AT DKW
BURBERRY UPGRADED TO 'OVERWEIGHT' VS 'NEUTRAL' AT JP MORGAN
AVIVA UPGRADED TO 'BUY' AT MERRILL LYNCH
PRUDENTIAL CUT TO 'NEUTRAL', ROYAL & SUN CUT TO 'SELL' AT MERRILL LYNCH
PETER HAMBRO INITIATED 'BUY' AT MERRILL LYNCH, PRICE TARGET 1200P

Off to find some news....

Happy trading!

G.

Share guide

Morning all. Will BARC continue its rise today?

Morning all

MKS expected good news arrives and the price drops ;-).

BARC (like a lot of the market seems to be dropping back) - ex div day tommorrow another negative day?

NFDS is bucking the trend - but I think someones realised they go ex div at the end of Jan.

End-of-day Market Summary