Alliance News Snips12 Aug 2020 13:29
Continuing hopes for a vaccine and the prospect of a big stimulus package in the US are enabling investors to look past the global coronavirus crisis to the sunny uplands of recovery. The worst quarterly fall in output since records began in the UK and the resulting slide into a deep recession was met with a shrug - the pound pretty stable against other major currencies - as it had been widely anticipated," AJ Bell's Russ Mould said.
US stock market futures were pointed higher as vaccine hopes offset the deadlock over a US stimulus package on Capitol Hill.
The DJIA was called up 0.9%, the S&P 500 index up 0.7% and the Nasdaq Composite up 0.8%.
US President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced a USD1.5 billion contract with biotech company Moderna for 100 million doses of an eventual coronavirus vaccine, the sixth such deal reached since May.