Legal & General Share News (LGEN)

City sources predict the FTSE 100 will open up one point from yesterday's close of 5,809, ignoring a strong finish in the US ahead of UK industrial and manufacturing output data. Thoughts have also already turned to important data due out on Thursday from China, which will include both inflation and industrial production figures. Also scheduled for Thursday is the Bank of Japan´s rate setting meeting, as well as several economic indicators Stateside.The US Federal Reserve´s Senior Loan Officer bank lending survey data was realeased overnight and economists at Barclays Research had this to say: "All in all, a mildly positive report, with a trend towards a loosening of lending standards (or a tightening at a less aggressive rate) across most corporate and household components. A clearer sign of a pickup in residential loan demand supports our view that a gradual housing sector recovery is in place and will increasingly be evident across measures of housing starts, sales and prices." Retail sales rose by 0.1% in value terms -in like-for-like terms- in the UK during the month of July, according to data out from the British Retail Consortium (BRC) this morning.Industrial production data for the month of July is due out at 09:30 from the Office for National Statistics. Emerging markets focused banking titan Standard Chartered has been called to task by the US banking regulator for alleged collusion with the government of Iran to hide transactions from the US authorities. Standard Chartered believes that the interpretation reflected in the Department of Financial Services's order of the U-Turn exemption is "incorrect as a matter of law". The banking group's review of its Iranian payments also did not identify a single payment on behalf of any party that was designated at the time by the US government as a terrorist entity or organisation. Nomura has downgraded the stock as a result of this news.Intercontinental Hotels saw revenues rise in the first half of the year and said it would return one billion dollars to shareholders. The funds will be returned to shareholders via a $500m special dividend, to be paid in the fourth quarter of 2012, and a $500m share buyback programme that will begin at the same time.Life insurance and pensions group Legal and General hiked its interim dividend by almost a fifth as the group expressed 'resilience' amidst tough conditions. The half-year dividend per share was raised by 18% from 1.66p to 1.96p, while basic earnings per shares rose 14% from 6.13p to 6.96p. Pre-tax profit in the six months to June 30th increased by 11% from £471m to £525m.