London pre-open: US to spark early rally

21st Jul 2010 07:26

Late gains in the US and solid results from Apple after Wall Street closed look set to send London back towards 5,200 in early deals.Futures point to an initial 50-point surge for the FTSE 100 this morning, potentially ending a five-day losing streak.In company news, after years of rumour and speculation, one of the market's most widely tipped takeovers is about to come to fruition after condom and footcare group SSL agreed an all-cash bid from Reckitt Benckiser. Reckitt is to pay SSL shareholders 1,163p per share with a final dividend taking the total up to 1,171p per share. The bid values SSL in total at £2.54bn. The offer price is a premium of a third to the closing price yesterday of SSL, which is best known for its Durex and Scholl brands.Ocado has slashed the price at which shares grocery delivery group will be floated following widespread criticism of its initial flotation plans. Shares in the company, which delivers groceries from the supermarket Waitrose, will be floated at 180p, which is at the bottom end of the 180p to 200p range Ocado outlined yesterday. It had previously indicated a price range of 200p to 275p. Analysts had lined up to criticise Ocado’s plans to value itself at between £800m and £1.2bn.Embattled oil giant BP has done a deal to sell $7bn of upstream assets in the United States, Canada and Egypt to Apache Corporation. Assets include its Permian Basin assets in Texas and south-east New Mexico, its Western Canadian upstream gas assets, and the Western Desert business concessions and East Badr El-din exploration concession in Egypt. BP said the sales are part of its plan, announced last month, to raise $10bn by offloading non-core assets to cover claims made following the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.