RAMSEY CROOKALL

24  th  October 2011

Morning Report

The FTSE 100 is up 0.25%. Miners lead the upside after China PMI rebounds strongly in October. Banks are still up, although caution persists, as there were few details after the weekend meeting of European leaders.  There are no further economic data releases of note. Before Wall Street's open, Caterpillar is scheduled to report quarterly earnings.

The positive manufacturing data from China lifted copper prices on Monday, with copper futures up 4.08%. Kazakhmys, Antofagasta, Rio Tinto, Xstrata, BHP Billiton, Lonmin and Eurasian Natural Resources were higher in early trading.

Essar Energy, the India-focused integrated energy company, rose strongly after completing the 35 day shut-down of the 300,000 barrels-a-day Vadinar Refinery in western Gujarat on schedule.

InterContinental Hotels Group was also higher after seeing like-for-like revenue per available room grow by 8% in the US during the third quarter, as occupancy rose by 3 percentage points.

Diamond miner Gem Diamonds rose after announcing that it is to pocket around $16.5m through the sale of the Letšeng Star, the 14th largest white diamond on record.

THE FTSE 100  at 10:20                     Up       16         @         5505

THE DOW JONES closed                       Up       267       @         11808 

NASDAQ COMP closed                         Up       38         @         2637               Commodities Spot Gold $/Oz           $1648                    Up                  0.51 %     Brent Crude Oil          $110.03                  Up                  0.30 %

Exchange Rates GBP – USD               1.5942 GBP - EURO              1.1506