The Market Report with Katie Pilbeam.
FTSE 100 was up 32 points to 7,546 in Friday morning trading led by online education specialist Pearson, although AstraZeneca was dragging on the market.
Shares in the pharma giant fell even though it repeated its guidance for the full year after it reported forecast-beating results for the first quarter, boosted by sales of its diabetes drug and Covid-19 vaccine.
NatWest doubled its profits in the first-quarter to £1.2bn. The nationwide lender warned that its outlook for the rest of the year would be clouded by the rising cost of living crisis.
It was a big session for tech overnight in the US, with Apple reporting a record-breaking March quarter for revenues, demonstrating strong consumer demand for the company’s products and services. Revenues exceeded analyst expectations of US$94.4bn.
Amazon though reported its first quarterly loss since 2015. The e-commerce and streaming giant blamed it on a significant write-down in value of its investment in electric-vehicle start-up Rivian.
Back in the UK, Travis Perkins (LSE:TPK) (Travis Perkins (LSE:TPK)) said it is now "more uncertain" about its forecast for price inflation in building materials, having previously expected it to ease into the second half of the year. Pricing is now expected to account for a larger share of sales growth this year than previously expected for the FTSE 250 company.
Among a host of quarterly small cap mining updates, European Metals said it on track to finalise the definitive feasibility study for its flagship asset at Cinovec in the Czech Republic. Discussions are also ongoing with potential off-takers for the project’s lithium and tin.