London pre-open: Stocks seen steady after Alphabet, Microsoft results

(Sharecast News) - London stocks were set for a steady open on Wednesday as investors mull results from Alphabet and Microsoft overnight. The FTSE 100 was called to open unchanged at 7,013.

CMC Markets analyst Michael Hewson said: "The Nasdaq 100 led last night's gains for US stocks, with a third successive positive daily close, however there was still some apprehension around the results from Microsoft and Google owner Alphabet, both of whom closed higher, not only around how much of a slowdown we might see in their latest quarterly numbers, but also what sort of outlook these big two tech giants would paint.

"In any event it was a mixed bag with Alphabet missing expectations, while Microsoft managed to outperform, however the shares of both still slid back after hours, although this weakness doesn't look set to weigh unduly on today's European open, due to strong gains in Asia markets.

"The miss from Alphabet was less of a surprise given the slowdown seen in Snap's numbers last week, with misses across all of its core businesses."

On home shores, banks were in focus, with results out from Barclays and Standard Chartered.

Barclays reported a fall in third quarter profits and a sharp rise in bad loan charges as consumers started to feel the impact of the cost-of-living crisis.

The company posted a profit before tax of £5.7bn. Impairment charges for the quarter rose to £722m compared with a £622m release last year as pressure from the Covid pandemic eased. Group income rose 17% to £6.4bn, driven by increases in interest rates.

Elsewhere, advertising giant WPP said that third-quarter revenues had surged, reflecting "broad-based growth" across its agencies, markets and industry sectors.

WPP said revenues had increased 10.3% in Q3 to £3.57bn, or 2.7% on a like-for-like basis, after winning $1.7bn in net new business throughout the period. Year-to-date revenues were up 10.2% at £10.32bn.