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London stocks surged on Wednesday, outpacing European rivals as the pound fell and the food and travel industry rose on optimism over lockdowns ending.
The FTSE 100 index
UKX,
climbed 0.9%, while the Stoxx Europe 600
SXXP,
backed away from a record high, dropping 0.2%. Driving U.K. gains was a 0.5% drop for the pound
GBPUSD,
which fell to $1.37530, a level not seen since early last week. A weak pound can help boost the FTSE, which is home to many multinational companies that derive revenue overseas.
“The new quarter has turned the tables in the currency market, as the rally in bond yields that turbocharged the dollar along with sterling last quarter seems to have run out of fuel for now, breathing some life back into the devastated euro and yen,” said Marios Hadjikyriacos, investment analyst at XM, in a note to clients.
“Treasury yields have cooled down in recent sessions, diminishing the dollar’s rate advantage,” he added. The yield on the 10-year note
TMUBMUSD10Y,
inched up to 1.66%, but well off a level of 1.77% seen late March. The yield on the 10-year U.K. gilt
TMBMKGB-10Y,
has cooled to 0.789% from 0.847% in late March and 0.877% in mid March.
Elsewhere, shares of banks and mining stocks were helping to underpin the index, with HSBC
HSBC,
HSBA,
shares up 1% and Rio Tinto
RIO,
RIO,
up 1.4%.
Oil companies were also in focus, with shares of Royal Dutch Shell
RDSA,
RDS.A,
flat. The energy giant warned of a $200 million hit for first-quarter adjusted earnings from a Texas storm, but would turn a first profit for its upstream oil and gas unit since the COVID-19 pandemic.
Read: Why Shell’s trading update still disappointed some analysts
Shares of rival BP
BP,
rose 2% after gains on Tuesday, as the oil group said it would hit its net debt target almost a year earlier than expected.
Also higher were shares of cruise operator Carnival
CCL,
which rose 5%, alongside gains for U.S. shares of Carnival Corp.
CCL,
and Norwegian Cruise Line
NCLH,
A spokeswoman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Jade Fulce, told Bloomberg on Tuesday that cruises could resume by midsummer on a restricted basis. Carnival Corp.’s Cruise Line on Tuesday threatened to take its ships to non-U.S. ports.
Shares of pub operator Mitchells & Butler
MAB,
climbed 3%.
Elsewhere, shares in Deliveroo
ROO,
rose almost 3% on Wednesday — the first day an estimated 70,000 individual investors were allowed to trade the Amazon
AMZN,
-backed company they bought during the food delivery company’s poor stock market debut last week.
