London pre-open: Stocks to fall amid rate hike worries

(Sharecast News) - London stocks were set to fall at the open on Wednesday following weak US and Asian sessions, amid worries about further rate hikes. The FTSE 100 was called to open 20 points lower at 7,957.

CMC Markets analyst Michael Hewson said: "European markets slipped back yesterday with the FTSE100 slipping below the 8,000 level and posting its biggest decline in two weeks, despite better-than-expected flash PMI numbers, for February.

"While a positive development, this served to help push yields higher in anticipation that central banks might have to be slightly more hawkish when it comes to raising rates in the coming weeks and looks set to weigh on markets further later this morning. This has certainly been borne out in Asia trading after the RBNZ hiked rates by 50bps with the prospect of more to come.

"These moves by central banks can across as counterintuitive given that the reason for the improvement in economic activity was due to sharp declines in energy prices which is also exerting downward pressure on inflation, however core inflation isn't coming down yet."

In corporate news, Lloyds Bank reported flat annual profits with higher net income and lower costs offset by impairment charges due to the worsening economic outlook.

The UK bank said full year pre-tax profits came in at £6.9bn and added that it would start another £2bn share buyback.

Net income rose 14% to £18bn and impairment charges for potential bad debts surged to £1.5bn compared with a release in 2021 of £1.3bn.

The dividend was lifted to 2.4p a share from 2p.

Rio Tinto and TBC Bank also had results out.