London pre-open: Stocks seen steady ahead of payrolls
London stocks were set for a muted open on Friday as investors eyed the latest non-farm payrolls report out of the US, with little in the way of UK corporate or economic news flow to move markets.
The FTSE 100 was expected to open four points lower at 7,691.
The Dow Jones breached the 25,000 level on Thursday, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq also racked up strong gains.
CMC Markets analyst David Madden said: "The rally in US stocks yesterday was also assisted by the strong ADP employment report. In December the US private sector employment report showed that 250,000 jobs were added, and that comfortably topped the forecast of 190,000. The ADP figures points to a strong jobs market, and it has set the tone for the US non-farm payrolls.
"Traders are anticipating 190,000, and that compares with the 228,000 jobs that were added in November. Unemployment is expected to hold steady at 4.1%. On a month-on-month basis average earnings are tipped to increase by 0.3% and on an annual basis they are forecasted to rise by 2.5%. The US has been steadily creating new jobs over the past few years, but wage growth has been sluggish. If the US economy wants to step up a gear in terms of economic growth, wage growth and in turn the spending levels will need to tick up."
The payrolls report is scheduled for release at 1330 GMT, along with the unemployment rate. There are no UK data releases of note due.
In corporate news, budget airline EasyJet reported a 5.5% year-on-year increase in passengers for December to 5.88m. The load factor was up to 91.4% from 89.9%.
Cancellations rose to 580 from 330 a year earlier, largely due to adverse weather conditions causing around 400 and runway closures making up the majority of the rest along with industrial action.
Shipping broker Clarkson said it expected full year results for 2017 to be in line with current expectations.
In a brutally short statement, the FTSE 250 group confirmed results for the calendar year will be released on 12 March 2018.