FTSE 100 edges higher as Sensex reclaims 53,000 and Wall Street tumbles on Covid fears

London’s FTSE 100 edged higher on Tuesday morning, following gains in the previous session.

The index was up 4 points in early trading at 7,081.72 following a 49-point gain on Monday, buoyed by mining stocks and positive company earnings.

Mining companies Anglo American, Rio Tinto, Antofagasta, BHP Group were among the top gainers, while Melrose Industries surged the most at 5 per cent.

Meanwhile, some mergers and acquisitions helped the domestically focused FTSE 250 to push to new heights with 259 points, or 1.1 per cent gains at 23,208.

Indian stock market benchmarks opened higher on Tuesday despite poor cues from Asian and the US markets as banking and consumer stocks advanced. BSE Sensex reclaimed the 53,000 level while NSE’s Nifty 50 is close to 16,000.

Asian stocks traded lower following the US peers, with Japan’s Nikkei and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng trading deep in the red, while South Korea’s Kospi and Mainland China’s Shanghai Composite remained nearly flat in the half of the session.

Stocks on Wall Street witnessed sell-off in the later hours of trading sessions as worries of rising Covid-19 cases gripped investors once again, overshadowing a strong second-quarter earnings season. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell by a hundred points, while S&P 500 slipped 0.2 per cent. Tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gave up its early gains to close near the flatline.

The seven-day average of daily coronavirus cases in the US reached 72,790 on Friday, surpassing the peak seen last summer, CNBC reported CDC Director Dr Rochelle Walensky as saying.