With the Chancellor set to announce a ban on letting fees charged to tenants the most drastic scenes this morning have come from the estate agent stocks; Foxtons and Countrywide have plunged 8.5% and 5.5% respectively, with both facing a big hit to their sources of income. Elsewhere there hasn’t been much excitement, yet – the FTSE has maintained a 30 point increase, leaving it at or around 6850, while a jittery pound slipped 0.1% against the dollar and 0.2% against the euro.
Over in the Eurozone the DAX and CAC weren’t particularly happy, with both indices falling around half a percent despite a set of solid flash manufacturing and services PMIs from the region. The euro’s mild gains against the pound and the dollar might have helped push the Eurozone indices lower, though it is still surprising just how much they have fallen.
Looking ahead to this afternoon and the US is keen to get a wave of B-tier data out of the way before it takes tomorrow off for Thanksgiving. Durable goods orders are expected to rebound to 1.2% from -0.3% last month, while the flash manufacturing PMI is set to creep 0.2 higher to 53.6; other figures include an earlier than usual look at the jobless claims reading, the new home sales number and the revised UoM consumer sentiment update.
Currently the Dow Jones futures appear disinterested in today’s goings on, though the index can be forgiven for sitting flat at an effective all-time high of 19025.
