RAMSEY CROOKALL & CO

13th September 2011

Evening  Report

The FTSE 100 finished up 0.9% at 5174, after a session of contrasting halves. The index reverses earlier losses and banks are both sold and bought heavily in a tempestuous session. The Royal Bank of Scotland ended up 5.3%, Lloyds Banking Group up 4.2% and Barclays up 4.7%, as sentiment in Europe improves. Investors are looking forward to Wednesday's reported conference call involving German, French and Greek leaders and hope it will bring some clarity on Greece's debt crisis.   On Wednesday, U.K. claimant count and unemployment rate data will be closely watched at 0830 GMT.

Today’s big mover, Cairn Energy finished down 8.2% after reporting disappointing results from its offshore drilling campaign offshore Greenland, with one well coming up dry and another showing only minor hydrocarbons.

Restaurant and pubs group Mitchells & Butlers, jumps 6.5% after rejecting a takeover offer from its largest shareholder, the billionaire Joe Lewis.

Spread-betting firm IG Group edged higher after revealing that revenues reached £100m in the first quarter, after saying in August that it expected sales to pass the £94m mark.

Train and coach operator National Express has acquired the fifth largest provider of student transportation services in the US for $200m. Shares rose over 1.5%.

Commercial vehicle hire company Northgate was in demand as it said despite tough economic conditions hitting its UK and Spanish markets, trading between May and September has been in line with the company expectations.

Despite seeing record profits in the year ended June, asset manager Ashmore Group fell on the back of disappointment over the level of performance fees for funds ending (August) in the current financial year. The group also warned that while it recorded a fifth successive year of operating margin "in the 70s" (72%), "we would expect this to finally enter the '60s' in the year to come".

THE FTSE 100 Closed                        Up 44        @    5,174

THE DOW JONES @ 16.45                      Down 23        @    11,038

THE NASDAQ COMP @ 16.45                   Up 13        @  2,508 Exchange Rates

GBP – USD     @ 16.45      1.5799

GBP - EURO    @ 16.45      1.1549