What happened yesterday?
Tech companies drove gains in U.S stocks as investors snapped up the likes of Zoom, while West Texas Intermediate crude oil rose 1.1% to $43.05 a barrel.
As of 11:31 New York time, the S&P 500 Index had risen 0.3%, while the MSCI Asia Pacific Index increased 0.4%. FTSE 100, however, closed down more than 101 points at 5,826 on the first day back after the long August weekend, as stronger sterling and a poor performance from banking and energy stocks weighed on the benchmark.
In terms of bonds, Britain’s 10-year yield fell one basis point to 0.30% and Germany’s fell two basis points to –0.42%.
Gold strengthened 0.3% to $1,974.38 an ounce and copper fell 1.1% to $3.028 a pound.
And in company news:
Tesla has announced that it intends to raise $5 billion by selling shares, as it capitalises on the six-fold surge in its share price this year, as it reportedly requires more capital to invest in a new product pipeline that includes the “Cybertruck” pick-up model and a semi haulage truck. (£)
Google has confirmed that it will be increasing the price of advertising on its platforms in the UK starting November 2020, due to UK’s Digital Services Tax. The fee will apply to all adverts served in the UK across both Google Ads and YouTube.
Unilever has pledged to invest £1 billion in eliminating fuel-based ingredients from its cleaning products by 2030. The company’s ‘clean future’ initiative aims to develop renewable or recycled alternatives as part of the company’s mission to eliminate carbon emissions from its products by 2039.
