London pre-open: Slight rise expected after Tuesday's heavy losses

9th May 2012 07:37

City sources predict the FTSE 100 will open up 12 points from yesterday's close of 5,555, somewhat paring loses of 101 points in the previous session as political uncertainty in Greece continues to demoralise investors across Europe. Terrestrial broadcaster ITV has forecast its first half net advertising revenues (NAR) will be ahead of the market, thanks to an expected boost from the Euro 2012 football tournament. The company issued guidance of a year-on-year (y/y) increase of 3% in NAR for the first half of 2012, despite ITV Family NAR easing 1% y/y in the first quarter to £362m from £365m the year before.GlaxoSmithKline has taken an offer of 13 dollars a share directly to the shareholders of Human Genome Sciences (HGS). In April GSK made an offer to purchase US biopharmaceutical firm HGC, but saw its bid 'rejected without discussion'. HGS replied that the UK pharmaceuticals giant had made an offer that did not reflect the "value inherent in the company". Underlying profit before tax from supermarket titan Sainsbury came in bang in line with expectations, while the full year dividend is a little more generous than anticipated. Underlying profit before tax in the 15 weeks to March 17th was up 7.1% to £612m from £665m the year before, on total sales (including value added tax) that rose 6.8% to £24,511m from £22,943m a year earlier.