London pre-open: Wall Street tail-winds boost London

20th Jul 2011 07:37

After the Dow Jones had its best day of the year overnight investors are keen to get their wallets out this morning and dive into equities.City traders think the blue-chip index will open around 30 points higher and crash back through the 5,800 barrier.One stock unlikely to be joining the upsurge is drugs giant AstraZeneca, after the advisory committee of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) narrowly voted to recommend that FDA approval should be given to dapagliflozin, the diabetes drug Astra jointly developed with Bristol-Myers Squibb, because of safety concerns.Mining giant BHP Billiton was able to achieve another iron ore output record in the year ended 30 June, its eleventh consecutive annual production record. The firm said that annual production records were achieved across four commodities and ten operations "as a result of our strategy to invest throughout the economic cycle." Not much has changed at water company Severn Trent since the beginning of April with the company continuing to trade in line with expectations. Due to planned investment in growth opportunities in Operating Services and new water purification products, which will offset growth in the underlying business, profit before interest and tax is still expected to be lower than last year. --jh