The FTSE 100 held onto a small gain on Monday even as fresh U.S. strikes on Iran drove oil sharply higher and revived fears over the Strait of Hormuz. Energy-heavy blue chips cushioned London while Germany’s DAX and France’s CAC 40 slipped.
Britain’s blue-chip index shrugged off a fresh Middle East escalation that sent crude prices climbing, as the FTSE 100 rose 0.07% on Monday. Energy-weighted shares offset a broader risk-off mood that pulled other European markets lower.
Elsewhere on the continent, Germany’s DAX slipped 0.16% and France’s CAC 40 inched down 0.20%. Sterling eased against the dollar, with GBP/USD down 0.16% at 1.3386 as of 07:25 GMT.
Oil climbs on renewed Hormuz fears
The U.S. military carried out a fresh round of strikes against Iran on Sunday, with U.S. Central Command saying the action aimed to further degrade Tehran’s ability to target commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. That followed a third round on Saturday, in which CENTCOM said U.S. forces hit roughly 140 Iranian military targets, more than 300 across three nights.
President Donald Trump told NBC’s Meet the Press that the strait remained open. According to Investing.com: “We bombed the hell out of them last night,” he said, contradicting Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority, which said passage stayed closed pending a security review.
As a result, oil pushed higher on supply-disruption fears. Brent crude rose 3.8% to $78.86 a barrel, while WTI gained 3.7% to $74.06. Finimize noted the Strait of Hormuz is one of the world’s most important shipping routes for crude, so even a hint of interference can quickly lift prices and, in turn, near-term inflation expectations.
Gold slips as havens lose their shine
Gold moved the other way. Gold futures fell 1.2% to $4,065.02 an ounce, while spot gold dropped 1.6% to $4,056.82. Finimize explained that gold is often treated as a haven during geopolitical stress but can struggle when traders start pricing a rates-higher-for-longer response from central banks.
Corporate news steadies London
Company results helped London stay in the green. PageGroup beat second-quarter gross profit expectations as strength in the Americas and Asia offset weakness in Europe and the UK. Plus500 reaffirmed full-year guidance after its strongest first-half revenue in three years, supported by higher trading activity and U.S. expansion.
Finimize added that drugmaker GSK said its cancer drug Jemperli met the main goal in a mid-stage trial, while gene-sequencing firm Oxford Nanopore Technologies flagged first-half revenue below its own expectations.
Sources: Investing.com, Finimize
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