London open: Stocks gain on optimism about 'fiscal cliff'

Equity markets rose sharply on Monday morning as hopes about US lawmakers nearing a resolution to the 'fiscal cliff' sparked investors' appetites for riskers assets, such as mining stocks.Markus Huber, the head of German HNW trading at ETX Capital said this morning: "After Friday's heavy sell-off European equities are starting out the new week on a positive note regaining a large chunk of the losses incurred. Comments by US politicians with both parties showing optimism that a deal will be reached to avert the 'fiscal cliff' is giving markets a sharp lift to the upside this morning."Markets were also digesting comments made by Bank of England policy maker David Miles this weekend. In an interview with Sky News, he said: "if it turns out that not enough has been done, that the economy's going to stay in a recessionary state and that's going to drive inflation down, there is more we can do. We have not run out of ammunition."Little data elsewhere is due out this morning, with the focus of investors likely to be on developments of fiscal cliff talks Stateside and tomorrow's Eurogroup meeting on Greece in Brussels.ETX's Huber said: "It will be interesting to see how long the current optimism will last and how quickly the focus will shift to Greece, so far in the US all we have are words and any kind of deal still seems to be far off at this stage and concerning Greece there are still huge divisions between individual countries how to raise the additional funds needed."He noted that this week is likely to see volumes decline substantially as the week progresses with US markets closed for Thanksgiving on Thursday.FTSE 100: Miners gain as risk appetite increasesMining stocks were benefitting from the bullish mood this morning with ENRC, Kazakhmys, EVRAZ, Vedanta and Fresnillo making decent gains.Resources peer BP was also a high riser on reports that it is considering a share repurchase programme of around $4bn after it banks the proceeds of the TNK-BP sale to Rosneft.Banking giant HSBC rose after confirming press speculation that it is mulling a sale of its minority stake in Chinese insurance giant Ping An Insurance. HSBC holds a 15.57% stake in Ping An, China's second-largest insurance firm by assets, which is worth an estimated $9.5bn. Financial services giant Old Mutual was in demand after snapping up a majority stake in Latin American AIVA Business Platforms in an effort to strengthen its distribution capability in selected emerging markets.Temporary power and temperature control giant Aggreko gained after winning a $75m contract in Côte d'Ivoire to provide short-term power supply. Cruise operator Carnival continued to rise after announcing Friday that it will be paying 50 US cents a share to investors next month as a special dividend, in additional to the previously-announced regular quarterly payout of $0.25 per share.Quality and safety testing group Intertek fell after admitting that revenue growth slowed down from 29.9% in the first half to 20.1% during the 10 months to the end of October.FTSE 250: Ocado soars after finding time and moneyOnline grocer Ocado jumped after saying it had secured more time to pay off debts and would raise £35.8m through a placing of shares. The firm said it would use the extra time and money to increase its ranges, improve the customer experience and go on a marketing drive. Siberian explorer RusPetro surged after reporting that increased oil production led to a 22% jump in revenue in the third quarter. FTSE 100 - RisersEurasian Natural Resources Corp. (ENRC) 268.80p +3.54%Barclays (BARC) 241.90p +3.29%Kazakhmys (KAZ) 674.00p +2.98%ARM Holdings (ARM) 729.50p +2.60%Evraz (EVR) 223.60p +2.29%Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,059.00p +2.22%Aviva (AV.) 326.90p +2.16%Polymetal International (POLY) 1,135.00p +2.16%Fresnillo (FRES) 1,917.00p +2.13%BP (BP.) 425.40p +2.11%FTSE 100 - FallersIntertek Group (ITRK) 2,793.00p -1.52%G4S (GFS) 241.80p -0.94%Shire Plc (SHP) 1,719.00p -0.58%Serco Group (SRP) 547.50p -0.45%Amec (AMEC) 991.00p -0.35%Sage Group (SGE) 299.30p -0.33%Experian (EXPN) 1,018.00p -0.29%Melrose (MRO) 208.80p -0.05%Capita (CPI) 713.00p 0.00%AstraZeneca (AZN) 2,792.50p 0.00%FTSE 250 - RisersOcado Group (OCDO) 74.50p +23.04%Ruspetro (RPO) 94.00p +6.82%Talvivaara Mining Company (TALV) 111.00p +5.01%Ferrexpo (FXPO) 206.00p +4.04%Lonmin (LMI) 488.40p +3.63%Regus (RGU) 99.80p +3.21%Petropavlovsk (POG) 359.90p +3.15%Diploma (DPLM) 450.00p +2.74%Henderson Group (HGG) 112.00p +2.66%Bovis Homes Group (BVS) 501.25p +2.44%FTSE 250 - FallersMitie Group (MTO) 280.90p -3.14%IP Group (IPO) 106.60p -2.02%Rank Group (RNK) 143.00p -1.99%Dunelm Group (DNLM) 660.00p -1.49%Menzies(John) (MNZS) 576.50p -1.28%Stobart Group Ltd. (STOB) 109.50p -1.26%Bank of Georgia Holdings (BGEO) 1,081.00p -1.01%Domino Printing Sciences (DNO) 527.50p -0.94%Mitchells & Butlers (MAB) 323.20p -0.86%Genus (GNS) 1,280.00p -0.85%BC