Weekly review
By Josh White
Date: Friday 16 Jan 2026
(Sharecast News) - The FTSE 100 ended the week up 110.82 points, or 1.09%, closing at 10,235.29 on Friday.
Equity view
Textile services provider Johnson Service Group said on Friday that revenues had increased in the year ended 31 December, helping it deliver solid adjusted operating profit growth. Johnson Service expects revenues to have risen 4.3% to £535.6m, while revenue in its catering division was set to increase to £390m from £371.2m, and workwear revenue was forecast to edge up to £145.6m from £142.2m. On an organic basis, group revenue was seen roughly 1.4% higher than the prior year.
Polar Capital has announced plans to launch a £15m share buyback after a strong third quarter, as a solid fund performance and net inflows pushed assets under management to a new record high. AUM rose 6% over the three months to 31 December to £28.4bn, up from £26.7bn at the end of the September and £21.4bn at the end of the previous fiscal year.
Animal genetics specialist Genus upped guidance on Friday, on the back of robust trading. The London-listed business said it had performed "strongly" in the six months to 31 December, and now expects adjusted pre-tax profits to come in around £50m in actual currency, ahead of internal forecasts.
Asset manager Ninety One said on Friday that assets under management stood at £159.8bn at 31 December, up from £152.1bn at the end of September and well ahead of the £130.2bn recorded a year earlier. The FTSE 250-listed firm also said it would publish its fourth-quarter assets under management update on 16 April.
Manufacturing and research company Oxford Instruments reaffirmed its full‑year guidance on Thursday, with adjusted operating profits expected to be in line with market forecasts of £70.2m to £73.0m. Oxford Instruments reported further progress in its imaging and analysis division, where order intake rose 2.4% on an organic constant currency basis. It also said the division's year‑to‑date book‑to‑bill ratio stands at 1.1, with cost‑reduction measures completed in the first half at its Belfast imaging unit delivering the anticipated benefits in the second half.
Homewares retailer Dunelm has said it expects full-year profits to come in at the lower end of market forecasts as a result of a "challenging environment" in the first half, in which sales growth slowed significantly towards the end of 2025. Sales totalled £498m over the second quarter to 27 December, up just 1.6% year-on-year, following a 6.2% jump in the first quarter, which the company said reflected consumer behaviour and tough trading conditions during Black Friday and December.
Pub group Mitchells and Butlers said first quarter like-for-like sales grew to 4.5%, driven by a strong Christmas period. The All Bar One and Harvester owner said LFL sales from Christmas Eve to New Year's Day rose 10.5%.
Asset manager Schroders said on Thursday that its full-year results were set to come in ahead of market expectations, with adjusted operating profits expected to be at least £745m, up from £603.1m a year earlier. Schroders stated adjusted net operating income was expected to be no less than £2.58bn, compared with £2.44bn in 2024, helped by a favourable assets under administration mix, while operating expenses were seen broadly unchanged year-on-year at around £1.83bn, reflecting continued cost discipline and progress on its transformation programme.
Blue chip insurer Prudential has named City veteran Douglas Flint as its next chair, it was confirmed on Wednesday. Flint, who spent more than two decades at Anglo-Asian lender HSBC, including seven as group chair, will replace current incumbent Shriti Vadera. The former Labour business minister is retiring after six years with Prudential.
Value-added services provider Diploma said on Wednesday that it had delivered a "very strong Q1 performance", with organic revenues growing 14% during the period. As a result, Diploma maintained its full-year guidance for organic revenue growth at 6% and margins at approximately 22.5%, while hiking net acquisition growth guidance to 3%. Additionally, it noted that organic growth guidance was "significantly weighted to H1".
Recruiter Hays reported a drop in net fees on Wednesday, citing challenging conditions in the permanent segment and a decline in average hours worked in Germany. In the three months to the end of December 2025, group net fees fell 10%, with temp & contracting and permanent fees down 8% and 14%, respectively.
Fund manager Liontrust Asset Management said on Wednesday that it had seen net outflows of £1,02bn in the three months ended 31 December, narrowing from £1.55bn a year earlier. Liontrust Asset Management said third-quarter assets under management and advice stood at £21.5bn at the end of December, with two mandate wins helping drive £330m of institutional net inflows during the period.
Hospitality group Whitbread reiterated its full-year outlook on Tuesday, after solid demand for hotel stays during the third quarter helped offset weaker food and drink sales. The blue chip owner of Premier Inn and Brewers Fayre, among others, posted a 2% increase in group sales in the 13 weeks to 27 November, to £781m, or 3% on a like-for-like basis.
UK housebuilder Persimmon said it expected annual earnings to be at the upper end of forecasts after a bigger-than-expected rise in home completions and added that the start to 2026 had been "encouraging". Completions for calendar 2025 rose 12% to 11,905, beating forecasts of 11,299, with average selling prices up 4%. Persimmon is guiding for underlying profit before tax of £415m to £440m, according to a company compiled estimate.
Real estate investor LondonMetric Property has snapped up nine Premier Inn hotels from Whitbread for £89m, making the hospitality group the fourth-largest occupier of LondonMetric assets. The 955-bedroom portfolio, which is focused around the South East of England, generates an annual rent of £5.0m with five-yearly inflation-linked rent reviews, and is let on new 30-year leases.
Low-cost computer maker Raspberry Pi said 2025 profits would be ahead of expectations after a strong second half but flagged uncertainty going into 2026 as the price of memory surged due to suppliers diverting products to artificial intelligence data centres. The company, which makes single-board products for tech enthusiasts, expects adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation to be not less than $45m, up more than a fifth on 2024.
The chief executive of The British Land Company is leaving to head up a pan-European logistics firm after five years in the role, it was announced on Monday. Simon Carter, who has been at British Land for a total of 18 years, is to join P3 Logistics Parks as chief executive following a 12-month notice period.
Trading platform tech group Plus500 said on Monday that it beat analysts' expectations with its 2025 results, as it painted a confident outlook for the coming year. In a pre-close trading update, Plus500 reported full-year revenues of $792m, up from $768m in 2024, while EBITDA increased to $348m from $342m.
Auction Technology Group was in the spotlight on Monday after its largest shareholder, FitzWalter Capital, issued a sharply critical public statement attacking the board's strategy and conduct in relation to a possible takeover, intensifying a dispute that began with ATG's rejection of a proposed offer earlier this month. In a statement, FitzWalter Capital responded to ATG's 5 January announcement, which disclosed and dismissed FitzWalter's indicative approach, and accused the board of presiding over "extreme shareholder value destruction".
Shares in Oxford Nanopore Technologies surged in early trading on Monday, after the FTSE 250 firm said full-year sales had beaten guidance. Updating on year-end trading, the business - a specialist in nanopore-based molecular sensing technology - said revenues were set to come in between £223m and £224m.
Economic news
The UK economy grew more than expected in November 2025, according to data released on Thursday by the Office for National Statistics. GDP grew 0.3% following a 0.1% contraction in October, and versus expectations for just 0.1% growth. September's figures were revised to show growth of 0.1%, up from an initial estimate of a fall of 0.1%.
House prices remained under pressure in December, a closely-watched survey showed on Thursday, but expectations for the coming months strengthened notably as surveyors became more optimistic. According to the latest residential market survey from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, the house price balance was -14 in December. That was unchanged on the previous month, after November's figure was revised up from -16.
Rightmove has predicted that average rents across the UK, excluding London, will rise by just 2% in 2026, as upwards pressure on prices continues to moderate compared with previous years. The average advertised rent of homes coming on to the market outside of the capital fell by 1.1% over the fourth quarter of 2025 to £1,370 per calendar month, the property platform announced on Thursday. This was only the second time in five years that quarterly rents have fallen.
A senior Bank of England policymaker reinforced expectations that UK interest rates will fall further on Wednesday, as inflation pressures ease more quickly than previously forecast, helped by cheaper imports, softer domestic costs and cooling wage growth. Alan Taylor, an external member of the Monetary Policy Committee at the Bank of England, said in a speech at the National University of Singapore that inflation was now likely to return sustainably to the 2% target by mid-2026, earlier than the Bank's prior projection of 2027.
Recruitment activity slowed as 2025 came to an end, a survey showed on Monday, weighed down by rising costs and ongoing economic uncertainty. According to December's UK report on jobs from KPMG and the Recruitment and Employment Confederation, the trade body, permanent staff appointments fell at the quickest rate since August.
International events
Americans lined up for unemployment benefits at a decelerated pace in the week ended 10 January, according to the Department of Labor. Initial jobless claims decreased to 198,000, down by 9,000 from the prior week's downwardly revised level, while continuing claims decreased by 19,000 to 1.88m.
The German economy expanded in 2025 for the first time in two years, official estimates showed on Thursday. According to provisional figures from Destatis, the Federal Statistical Office, GDP rose 0.2% year-on-year, or 0.3% once adjusted for calendar effects.
Industrial production across the eurozone rose for the third straight month in November, data from Eurostat showed on Thursday, while the region's trade surplus with the rest of the world fell more than expected. Seasonally adjusted industrial production increased by 0.7% in November across the single-currency region, following a 0.7% rise in October, coming in ahead of the 0.5% expected by analysts.
Oil prices were sharply lower on Thursday as supply fears eased after US president Donald Trump toned down his aggressive language towards Iran's leaders over the killing of anti-regime protestors Trump, who had threatened "very strong action" against the Islamic regime overnight claimed he had been told that killings in the crackdown on nationwide, protests were subsiding and he believed there was currently no plan for large-scale executions.
The US producer price index rose 0.2% month-on-month in November, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, hitting a reading of 150.71. On an annualised basis, producer prices increased by 3%. November's goods PPI advanced 0.9% month-on-month, the services PPI was unchanged on the month.
The vice president of the European Central Bank has said that global financial markets are not adequately pricing in the downside risks from elevated geopolitical tensions. In a speech in Madrid on Wednesday, Luis de Guindos said that the current environment of "profound transformation and heightened uncertainty" - driven by significant changes in US policy, the erosion of long-standing global trade dynamics and international relations, and elevated geopolitical risks - is "likely to persist".
US mortgage applications surged 28.5% in the week ended 9 January, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association of America, up from the prior week's far more modest 0.3% uptick. Applications to refinance a mortgage shot up by 40% week-on-week, while applications to purchase a home increased by 16.9%.
China's trade surplus with the rest of the world reached a record $1.2trn in 2025 as exports to the European Union and Southeast Asia surged in response to higher tariffs in the US. In dollar terms, the world's second-largest economy reported a trade balance of $1.189trn last year, up from 2024's record of $993bn.
New home sales across the United States were more or less unchanged in October, according to the Census Bureau, holding close to a two-year high set the previous month. Sales of new single-family houses came in at a seasonally-adjusted annual rate of 737,000 in October, just 0.1% below the September rate of 738,000, which was the highest since May 2023.
The World Bank expects global growth to moderate slightly in 2026, despite the world economy showing "notable resilience" over the last year. Publishing its latest semi-annual Global Economic Prospects report on Tuesday, the Washington-based body said the global economy had withstood "heightened trade tensions and policy uncertainty".
US inflation was unchanged month-on-month in December at 2.7%, according to official data published on Tuesday, well above the Federal Reserve's target of 2%. Food and housing costs remained elevated, contradicting US President Donald Trump's claim that he was lowering prices for American consumers.
A raft of central bank chiefs issued a joint statement on Tuesday in support of Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell, after the Trump administration threatened him with a criminal indictment. The heads of the Bank of England, the European Central Bank, the Bank of Canada, Sweden's Riksbank and seven other central banks said: "We stand in full solidarity with the Federal Reserve System and its Chair Jerome H. Powell. The independence of central banks is a cornerstone of price, financial and economic stability in the interest of the citizens that we serve.
The long-running row between US president Donald Trump and Federal Reserve chief Jerome Powell escalated on Sunday when the Department of Justice opened a criminal investigation into the central banker, sending the dollar lower. Powell said prosecutors had launched a criminal investigation into the $2.5bn renovation of the Federal Reserve's headquarters, and into his testimony about the project to the Senate banking committee in June last year.
Shares in Nasdaq-listed Abivax soared in pre-market trading on Monday after reports emerged that pharma giant Eli Lilly was preparing a $17.5bn bid for the Paris-based biotech firm. According to French publication La Lettre, Indiana-based Eli Lilly is considering making a €15bn offer for the company, though is waiting to see whether French regulators would raise any issues with foreign investment.
Shares in Sun County Airlines took off on Monday, after the US carrier agreed to be acquired by rival Allegiant Travel Company in a $1.5bn deal. Sun Country shareholders will receive 0.1557 shares of Allegiant common stock under the terms of the deal, as well as $4.10 in cash, for each share owned.
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