The UK market is in positive territory in afternoon trading Tuesday, even as debt concerns continued to haunt investor sentiment. The Asian markets mostly fell as relief over the bailout for Spanish banks gave way to skepticism.
The Euro Stoxx 50 index of eurozone bluechip stocks is adding 0.67 percent, while the Stoxx Europe 50 index, which includes some major U.K. companies, is gaining 0.72 percent.
The FTSE 100 index is currently adding 0.44 percent.
Fresnillo is gaining 2.2 percent and Randgold Resources is advancing 1.3 percent.
ICAP is advancing 2.6 percent. Admiral Group is gaining 1.9 percent.
British American Tobacco is adding 1.6 percent. Unilever and Vodafone are notably higher.
Marks & Spencer is losing 1.3 percent and Burberry Group is falling 1.1 percent. Sainsbury's is modestly up after it acquired a majority stake in online books platform Anobii.
Evraz is falling 2.6 percent. RPC Group is falling 7 percent after the rigid plastic packaging supplier said its outlook for the short term is "contending with a difficult and uncertain macro-economic environment."
Elsewhere in Europe, the German DAX is advancing 0.68 percent and the French CAC 40 is gaining 0.38 percent. Switzerland's SMI is rising 0.37 percent.
In economic news, U.K. manufacturing output dipped 0.7 percent month-on-month in April, reversing March's 0.9 percent rise, the Office for National Statistics said. The decline far exceeded economists' forecast of 0.1 percent fall.
Across Asia/Pacific, most major markets ended lower. China's Shanghai Composite Index declined 0.70 percent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.4 percent and Japan's Nikkei 225 retreated 1 percent. However, bucking the trend, Australia's All Ordinaries added 0.2 percent as trading resumed after a holiday yesterday.
In the U.S., futures point to a higher open on Wall Street. In the previous session, stocks finished sharply lower as optimism about an aid package to Spain gave way early in the session. The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 1.1 percent, the S&P 500 retreated 1.3 percent and the Nasdaq fell 1.7 percent.
In the commodity space, crude for July delivery is sliding $0.33 to $82.37 per barrel and August gold is falling $6.4 to $1590.4 a troy ounce.
by RTT Staff Writer
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