![\"FTSE](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/c4ec91ebd19f7b5ba8ebc7de8730ddb9.jpeg\")
FTSE 100 Live: London stocks edge higher as falling oil prices offer some relief Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock <\/p>\n FTSE 100 Live: London stocks edge higher as falling oil prices offer some relief Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock <\/p>\n
FTSE 100 rises 59 points to 10,123<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
Brent crude eases back 1.2%<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
Wall Street futures point higher<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
The FTSE 100 rose in opening trades, recovering some of Thursday’s steep losses, as oil prices eased after Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu said\u00a0Israel would no longer target Iran\u2019s energy infrastructure.<\/p>\n
Shortly into the session, London’s blue-chip index was up 59 points at\u00a010,122.64. It fell 2.4% yesterday. Brent crude oil was down 1.2% at $107.37 a barrel.<\/p>\n
Airline\u00a0easyJet PLC (LSE:EZJ)<\/a>\u00a0is leading the gainers, up 3%, followed by\u00a0Intercontinental Hotels Group PLC (LSE:IHG)<\/a>\u00a0with a 2.9% gain. easyJet is still down close to 25% since the Middle East conflict started, and Intercontinental Hotels is down around 7%.<\/p>\n Other gainers include\u00a0Melrose Industries PLC (LSE:MRO, OTC:MLSPF)<\/a>, British Airways owner\u00a0International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (LSE:IAG)<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Fresnillo PLC (LSE:FRES)<\/a>, all adding over 2%.<\/p>\n Smiths Group (LSE:SMIN)<\/a>\u00a0is leading the losers this morning, falling 4.9%, after the global technology company released half-year results and\u00a0trimmed full-year guidance.\u00a0BP PLC (LSE:BP.)<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Shell PLC (LSE:SHEL, NYSE:SHEL)<\/a>\u00a0are also down on the lower oil price.<\/p>\n US markets are also expected to open higher this afternoon, with futures for the Dow Jones, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq up between 0.1% and 0.3%.<\/p>\n Easter chocolate is getting a little less generous this year,\u00a0while prices keep heading in the opposite direction, according to\u00a0Which?<\/p>\n The watchdog found a clear case of \u201cshrinkflation\u201d across a range of big-name treats, with brands like\u00a0Cadbury,\u00a0Galaxy, and\u00a0Toblerone\u00a0quietly trimming sizes even as shelf prices rise.<\/p>\n The backdrop? Chocolate costs are climbing fast. While overall supermarket food inflation eased to 3.9%, chocolate prices jumped nearly 10%, largely due to global supply pressures.<\/p>\n That\u2019s left shoppers paying noticeably more per bite. Some of the biggest Easter eggs have shrunk significantly while rising sharply in price per 100g, often by 30\u201340% or more. And in some cases, sizes stayed the same, but prices soared, with certain sharing bags and mini eggs jumping by over 50%.<\/p>\n The takeaway: this Easter, you might need to hunt a little harder for value, because those eggs aren\u2019t quite as big (or as cheap) as they used to be.<\/p>\n More on those oil prices.<\/p>\n Deutsche Bank\u2019s\u00a0Jim Reid\u00a0said markets stabilised after an early surge in energy prices driven by Middle East tensions. Brent crude briefly spiked to $119 before easing back to around $107, while European gas prices also pared gains after sharp upward\u00a0moves.<\/p>\n Story continues <\/p>\n He noted that \u201cthe main saving grace\u201d was the pullback in oil prices as the\u00a0US\u00a0and\u00a0Israel\u00a0signalled they wanted to avoid further attacks on energy infrastructure, calming fears of escalation. This helped the S&P 500\u00a0recover losses, although Europe\u2019s\u00a0STOXX 600\u00a0still posted its worst close of the year.<\/p>\n Reid highlighted tentative signs of de-escalation, but warned that uncertainty remains high, with no clarity on the Strait of Hormuz and the potential for a prolonged conflict. He also pointed to lingering pressure in gas markets after damage to Qatar\u2019s LNG infrastructure, which could take years to repair.<\/p>\n The FTSE 100 is expected to creep\u00a0higher as the market pauses for breath after a rout saw the blue-chip index sink 242 points to 10,064, a\u00a02.4%\u00a0loss on Thursday.<\/p>\n Spreadbetters have the index opening 23 points higher when trading gets underway. Oil, in the meantime, has also levelled off, with Brent crude futures easing back 1.6% to $106.93 a barrel.<\/p>\n With energy markets in turmoil, threatening inflation. The\u00a0Reserve Bank of Australia has raised rates again, while the US Federal Reserve\u00a0stayed cautious, still signalling a possible rate cut if inflation falls to 2%, a scenario that looks optimistic, according to Swissquote’s Ipek Ozkardeskaya.<\/p>\n The\u00a0Swiss National Bank\u00a0has more flexibility, with inflation close to zero, she added. In contrast, the\u00a0European Central Bank\u00a0and\u00a0Bank of England\u00a0struck a more worried tone on inflation at the conclusion of their meetings yesterday, reflecting Europe\u2019s exposure to higher energy costs and weaker currencies against the dollar.<\/p>\n “A week packed with war headlines and central bank decisions comes to an end with one clear conclusion: the Middle East conflict is intensifying, and no one knows what the right monetary policy response should be,” Ozkardeskaya said.<\/p>\n “What everyone agrees on is that rising oil and energy prices will push inflation higher in the short to medium term, depending on the duration of the conflict,\u00a0while weighing on growth. This is a message echoed by the major central banks around the world.”<\/p>\n In the US, stocks finished the session slightly lower on Thursday, with major indexes drifting into the red as traders balanced geopolitical headlines, energy moves, and a stronger US\u00a0dollar.<\/p>\n The Dow Jones slipped about 0.4%, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq each eased roughly 0.3%.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FTSE 100 Live: London stocks edge higher as falling oil prices offer some relief Proactive uses images sourced…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":838068,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7757],"tags":[58516,748,54234,25799,393,111712,1880,39799,4884,240036,837,257,40975,2662,16,15],"class_list":["post-838067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-london","tag-brent-crude","tag-britain","tag-easyjet-plc","tag-energy-infrastructure","tag-england","tag-fresnillo-plc","tag-ftse-100","tag-gas-prices","tag-great-britain","tag-intercontinental-hotels","tag-israel","tag-london","tag-melrose-industries-plc","tag-oil-prices","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116260708460801972","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/838067","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=838067"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/838067\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/838068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=838067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=838067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=838067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}