London pre-open: Footsie to inch higher

29th Sep 2010 07:40

US stocks battled away last night to finish with a decent lead, but that hasn't impressed traders over here, with London expected to make just small gains in opening deals.Futures prices indicate a 5-point advance at the start.In company news, British Airways has signed a huge transatlantic ticketing and revenue share agreement with American Airlines and merger partner Iberia to start in October. The deal is worth a combined $7bn in annual revenues and allows the three airlines to co-operate commercially on flights between the European Union, Switzerland and Norway and the United States, Mexico and Canada. Smiths Group has ramped up full-year headline profit by 17% and is delivering on its cost savings ahead of plan, but the diversified high-tech group warns that growth in both sales and profit will be slower this year. Headline profit before tax, which strips out all sorts of one off items, jumped to £435m in the year ended 31 July, but constraints on government spending will continue to affect sales growth, down 2% this time excluding the impact of currency moves and acquisitions.Fast growing pizza delivery franchise operator Domino's Pizza has not been growing quite so fast in the last three months but still notched up an enviable increase in like for like (LFL) sales. In the 13 weeks to 26 September LFL sales were 9.9% higher than a year earlier, while in the year to date LFL sales were up 12.5% on a year earlier.Energy supplier Scottish and Southern Energy (SSE) has assured the market it is on course to deliver on its pledge of above-inflation dividend increases. The company has set a principal financial objective for 2010/11 of an increase in the dividend of at least two percentage points above the Retail Prices Index inflation rate, while maintaining a dividend cover consistent with its established range, and said it is on course to meet this objective.