LONDON MARKET EARLY CALL: Stocks Seen Down On Wall Street Losses

LONDON (Alliance News) - Shares are set to open lower in London on Wednesday following Wall Street's negative close and weak trading in Asia, with UK investors focusing on the release of the minutes from the last Bank of England's monetary policy meeting.

Ahead of the minutes, due at 0930 BST, Bank of England Governor Mark Carney on Tuesday repeated his view that the picture on interest rate policy in the UK will become clearer towards the end of the year.

Speaking at an event held by think-tank The Policy Exchange, Carney said the UK economy is still facing challenges from the economic weakness in the eurozone, the strength of sterling, and further UK government austerity measures.

The remarks echo those Carney gave during a speech at Lincoln Cathedral last week, when he hinted that the central bank will start to consider changing its UK interest rate policy at end of 2015, but said that any increases would be slow and suggested that interest rates would rise to no more than 2.25% in the medium term.

IG says futures indicate the FTSE 100 to open 29 points lower at 6,739.70. The index closed Tuesday down 0.3% at 6,769.07.

In Asia on Wednesday, the Japanese Nikkei 225 trades down 1%. In China, the Hang Seng is down 1.2% and the Shanghai Composite is down 0.7%.

Wall Street ended lower Tuesday. The DJIA closed ended down 1.0%, the S&P 500 closed down 0.4% and the Nasdaq Composite finished down 0.2% after reaching a new closing high on Monday.

Tech giant Apple reported its third quarter results after the US stock markets close. It said its third quarter profit rose 38% from last year, driven by strong sales of iPhone and Mac as well as all-time record revenue from services and the successful launch of Apple Watch. The company's quarterly earnings per share also came in above analysts' expectations as did its quarterly sales. However, the company forecast fourth quarter sales slightly below analysts' current consensus estimate.

"We had an amazing quarter, with iPhone revenue up 59% over last year, strong sales of Mac, all-time record revenue from services, driven by the App Store, and a great start for Apple Watch," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO

Meanwhile, mining giant BHP Billiton reported a 6% increase in iron ore production for the fourth quarter, while production of metallurgical coal grew 13%.

Total iron ore production for fiscal year 2015 increased 14% and exceeded the company's own outlook. Further, the company said it expects underlying attributable profit for the 2015 June half year to include additional charges of up to USD650 million, tied mainly to writedowns and redundancies in its copper business.

Issuing its production report for the fourth quarter ended June 30, 2015, BHP Billiton said it recorded a 6% increase in production of iron ore from the year-ago period to 60.09 million tons. Production also rose 2% from the prior quarter.

In a busy UK corporate calendar Wednesday, ARM Holdings releases half-year results, easyJet issues a third-quarter interim management statement, and Johnson Matthey and Land Securities Group issue first-quarter interim management statements. Qinetiq Group and PayPoint publish interim management statements. Tungsten Corp releases full-year results and Morgan Advanced Materials half-year results. Sage Group and Euromoney Institutional Investor provide third-quarter interim management statements, Fenner releases a third-quarter trading statement, and TalkTalk Telecom Group and Energy Assets Group publish first-quarter interim management statements.

In the economic calendar, in the US, the housing price index is due at 1400 BST, US Markit purchasing manager's Composite and Services indices are due at 1445 BST, and US existing home sales are due at 1500 BST. EIA Crude Oil stocks are due at 1530 BST.

By Daniel Ruiz; danielruiz@alliancenews.com

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