Weekly review
By Josh White
Date: Friday 10 Jul 2026
(Sharecast News) - The FTSE 100 ended the week down 182.09 points, or 1.71%, closing at 10,497.29 on Friday.
Equity view
Textile services provider Johnson Service Group said on Friday that it still expects to deliver "another year of progress" in FY26, despite a drop in first‑half hotel, restaurant and catering (HORECA) revenues, as margin improvement and cost discipline continue to support performance. Johnson Service said revenues for the six months ended 30 June were broadly unchanged at £258m, with workwear revenue up from £72.1m in FY25 to £74m and HORECA revenues easing from £185.4m to £184m amid ongoing weakness across UK and Irish hospitality. Organic revenues slipped 0.7%, with workwear up 2.6% and HORECA down 2%, though the firm expects normal summer seasonality to lift volumes in the second half.
LondonMetric Property and Schroders Real Estate Investment Trust have sweetened their takeover offer for Picton Property Income, it was confirmed on Friday. Under the terms of the revised approach, Picton shareholders will receive 0.910 LondonMetric shares and 0.894 SReit shares for every Picton share they own. It increases the SReit exchange ratio from 0.881 per Picton share, while the LondonMetric ratio is left unchanged.
Shares in St James's Place tumbled on Friday following a report that one of its largest partner firms, Sovereign Wealth, is the latest set to leave as the wealth manager faces retention challenges. According to Financial News, Sovereign Wealth is in talks about joining Swedish wealth management group Söderberg & Partners.
French billionaire Xavier Niel has agreed to acquire Emirates Telecommunications Group's entire stake in Vodafone for £4.4bn, it was announced on Friday, sending shares in the UK firm soaring. Under the terms of the deal, E&'s 16.21% holding has been priced at 112.5p per share, a 15% premium to Thursday's closing price of 97.76p.
Spire Healthcare said on Thursday that the 'put up or shut up' deadline for Toscafund Asset Management to make a takeover offer has been extended again as the investment firm continues to work towards the announcement of a 250p-a-share bid. The private hospital operator said Toscafund had confirmed that its due diligence process is well advanced and updated the board on the progress it has been making on other aspects of the cash offer.
Bytes Technology said on Thursday that it traded well in the first four months of the year, delivering double-digit year-on-year growth in gross invoiced income and gross profit across both the private and public sectors. Operating profit was broadly flat year-on-year, the company said in a statement ahead of its annual general meeting.
Computacenter lifted guidance on Thursday, sending shares soaring, after second-quarter trading was boosted by strong demand from hyperscalers. The technology and services provider said trading in the three months to 30 June had been ahead of expectations, building on an "excellent" first quarter.
Severn Trent said on Thursday that trading remained in line with expectations after a strong start to the 2027 financial year, leaving the water utility confident of delivering at least £50m of total performance incentives during the year. The FTSE 100 group said it invested around £440m in the first quarter, up 22% on the same period last year, and remains on track to deliver between £2.2bn and £2.5bn of capital expenditure across FY27.
Hammerson has sold £69m of non‑core assets, including several central Dublin holdings and another non‑core investment, taking its total disposals for 2026 to £75m after a final Leeds sale in January. The Dublin sites were bought by Transport Infrastructure Ireland to support the city's planned Metrolink rail system. It has kept other holdings in the Irish capital which it says offer strategic options for development, partnerships and future value creation, alongside its recent move to take full ownership of the Ilac shopping centre.
Galliford Try said it had won a place on the £1.5bn YORbuild Major Works 2 regional framework for a four-year period. The business has been appointed for projects in excess of £10m and £30m. The framework covers public sector building works in the eligible public sector bodies and third sector organisations across the Yorkshire and Humber region, as well as the North East of England, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and parts of Leicestershire.
Senior lifted its full-year outlook again on Wednesday as it highlighted "continued positive momentum". In a very brief statement, the manufacturer of high technology components and systems said: "Following the April 2026 trading update we have continued to see positive momentum in the business.
Housebuilder Vistry said on Wednesday that it expects to report a first‑half pre‑tax loss of around £30m, after cash‑generation measures and weaker partner‑funded volumes significantly weighed on profitability. Excluding those actions, Vistry said underlying pre‑tax profits would have been about £20m. It also stated the it expects FY26 adjusted pre‑tax profits to be in line with current consensus estimates, at around £200m, excluding any impact from its ongoing CEO review.
Safety equipment maker Halma on Tuesday said it had bought France-based Dreampath Diagnostics for an initial €154m (£132m), on a cash- and debt-free basis. Headquartered in Strasbourg, France, Dreampath makes automated systems that enable anatomical pathology laboratories to track, store and manage patient tissue samples throughout the diagnostic process.
Geotechnical contractor Keller Group lifted its full‑year guidance on Tuesday, saying revenue and underlying operating profit for 2026 were now expected to come in "materially ahead" of market consensus after a stronger‑than‑expected second quarter performance. Keller said its North American unit, the group's largest division, had benefited from record volumes and a sharp rise in demand for infrastructure and data‑centre work, more than offsetting a softer residential market in south Florida. It also said its North American unit had secured several high‑value infrastructure contracts during the period, with clients prioritising timely delivery on complex, large‑scale projects.
Transport company Firstgroup announced on Tuesday that it has been awarded the Sizewell C bus transport services contract, further strengthening its business and coach portfolio. Firstgroup said its Specialist Passenger Solutions subsidiary had been awarded the contract to operate worker transport and site shuttle services from points across Suffolk, to and from the Sizewell C nuclear power plant construction site.
Young's said on Tuesday that trading remained strong at the start of its new financial year, with revenue rising 9.4% in the 14 weeks to 6 July and like-for-like revenue up 5.5% against a strong comparative period. The pub operator said performance was driven by strong trading over the late May bank holiday, particularly at pubs with gardens and riverside locations, alongside demand linked to the FIFA World Cup, Wimbledon and contributions from the recently acquired Cubitt House estate.
ITV said on Monday that it has agreed to sell its media and entertainment business to Comcast-owned Sky for up to £1.6bn. Sky will pay £1.2bn in cash at completion. There will also be a contribution of Sky's Love Productions business for an agreed enterprise value of £200m, and a contingent cash consideration of up to £200m payable in the second half of 2028. The latter is subject to total advertising revenue performance in FY 2027 and certain trading balance adjustments.
High-performance computing firm Raspberry Pi tapped Tim Powell to take over as chief financial officer on Monday, succeeding Richard Boult with effect from 16 October. Raspberry Pi said Powell brings over 20 years' leadership experience across public companies. Most recently, he was CFO of Alpha Group, where he managed the company's move from AIM onto the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange and into the FTSE 250 and its subsequent sale to Corpay.
Protective equipment manufacturer Avon Technologies said on Monday that it has received a new order for its CBRN filters from an existing European NATO nation under the NATO Support & Procurement Agency framework contract. Avon Technologies said Avon Protection, its respiratory and integrated CBRN protection business unit, had received a $10.8m order that will support the ongoing modernisation of protective capability for military personnel and includes FM50 twin-filter Air Purifying Respirators, FM61EU filters and related accessories.
Ocado said on Monday that chief executive officer Tim Steiner will step down in 2028. Updating on the next phase of its long-term leadership transition, the company said Steiner will continue to serve as CEO through the start of the 2028 financial year and remains "fully committed to driving the company's strategy, operations and growth initiatives throughout this period". He will also continue to be actively involved with Ocado through 2029.
Economic news
The government said on Friday that it has designated cloud service providers Microsoft, Google, Amazon and Oracle as critical third parties (CTPs), bringing them under direct regulatory oversight "to help protect the UK's financial system". The move will come into effect on Monday. The government said: "As banks, insurers and financial market infrastructures become increasingly reliant on cloud services, disruption at a major supplier could affect multiple firms at the same time, potentially impacting services customers depend on."
Business confidence across the UK dropped to its lowest level in over a year in June, according to a survey released on Friday by S&P Global, with service-sector firms turning pessimistic about hiring intentions while input costs raise concerns in manufacturing. The headline reading of the tri-annual S&P Global UK Business Outlook survey, which tracks optimism levels towards private sector output over the coming 12 months, fell to +26% last month from +36% in February.
UK retail sales fell in June, with high streets faring the worst as the heatwave pushed shoppers indoors, according to a survey released on Friday by the British Retail Consortium. The BRC-Sensormatic footfall monitor showed that total footfall declined 3.4% on the year following a 2.6% drop in May.
House prices remained subdued in June, a closely-watched survey showed on Thursday, as the cost of living and wider geopolitical tensions weighed on sentiment. The latest residential market survey from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors showed house prices largely unchanged month-on-month, with a negative balance of -33. The balance was -34 in April and -35 in May.
The Bank of England on Tuesday unveiled a package of proposed reforms to the UK bank capital framework, which it said is designed to make the regime simpler, more effective and better aligned with international standards. The Financial Policy Committee (FPC), working alongside the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), said the proposals are intended to remove unintended consequences in existing leverage rules and improve the usability of capital buffers, enabling banks to better support lending during periods of stress.
House prices ticked up in June, industry data showed on Tuesday, as mortgage rates started to ease. According to the latest Lloyds house price index - formerly the Halifax HPI - British house prices increased 0.2% in June, following a 0.2% softening in May. It was the first increase for four months and slightly ahead of consensus expectations for a 0.1% uplift.
UK car registrations rose in June, according to preliminary figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers released on Monday. New car registrations increased 11.4% to 213,166 units, which was the best performance for the month since 2019.
The downturn in the UK construction sector eased slightly in June, according to a survey released on Monday. The S&P Global UK construction purchasing managers' index ticked up to 38.4 from a six-year low of 38.2 in May. However, it remained well below the 50.0 mark that separates contraction from expansion and construction output has now fallen every month since January 2025.
Business activity and confidence levels across the UK financial services sector slumped in the second quarter, according to a survey out on Monday from the Confederation of British Industry. After a temporary recovery over the first three months of the year, business volumes registered a significant reversal, with the number of firms seeing a decline in activity outweighing those reporting no change or an increase by a wide margin as the weighted balance shifted to -58% from +65% previously.
International events
Claims for unemployment benefits in the United States unexpectedly fell last week, according to the Department of Labor, hitting their lowest level since the middle of May. Seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims decreased 2,000 over the week to 4 July to 215,000, while the previous week's reading was revised up by 2,000 to 217,000.
Germany's trade surplus unexpectedly jumped in May, according to the country's federal statistics agency, as exports climbed to their highest level in three and a half years, driven by strong demand from the US. The overall balance of trade swelled to €19.1bn in May, up from a revised €14.7bn in April and ahead of the small increase to €14.8bn pencilled in by analysts.
Consumer inflation slowed slightly in China last month, official data showed on Thursday, narrowly missing expectations, while producer prices hit a near four-year high. According to the National Bureau of Statistics of China, the consumer price index eased to 1.0% in June, compared to 1.2% in both May and April. Economists had been expecting 1.1%. Month-on-month, CPI edged down 0.3%, compounding May's 0.1% softening.
The US has launched another round of attacks against Iran as tensions between the two countries continue to flare. US Central Command confirmed late on Wednesday that American forces had concluded an "additional round of strikes", hitting 90 Iranian military targets. It said the attacks were intended to "further degrade Iran's ability to attack commercial shipping and innocent civilian mariners in the Strait of Hormuz".
The International Monetary Fund nudged its global growth forecast a touch lower on Wednesday, but upgraded its expectations for the UK. In its July World Economic Outlook, the IMF said it now expects global growth of 3% this year, down from a forecast of 3.1% in April. It's also below the average of 3.5% seen in 2024-25.
US mortgage applications fell by 2.2% on the week ended 3 July, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Last week's modest decline came amid relative stability in benchmark mortgage rates, with the 30-year fixed rate rising just a single basis point to 6.58%, despite an increase in longer-term Treasury yields during the week.
The US will cut off all trade with Spain, Donald Trump claimed on Wednesday, as tensions over defence spending continued between the two countries. Speaking at the Nato summit at Ankara in Turkey, the US president called Madrid a "terrible partner" and said he had ordered US Treasury secretary Scott Bessent to cut trade with the country.
US President Donald Trump has said the ceasefire with Iran is over after both countries exchanged strikes overnight. Speaking to reporters at the Nato summit in Ankara, Turkey, Trump said he thought the ceasefire was over.
The US trade deficit widened sharply in May, according to the Census Bureau and Bureau of Economic Analysis, as exports fell and imports picked up. The goods and services deficit increased to $77.6bn, up from a revised $54.6bn in April, as exports dropped 3.2% on the month to $317.7bn, while imports rose 3.3% to $395.3bn. The goods deficit widened by $23.6bn to $106.5bn, while the services surplus edged up to $28.9bn.
German industrial production sparked in May, official data showed on Tuesday, surpassing expectations. According to provisional figures from Destatis, the Federal Statistical Office, price-adjusted production rose 0.9%, comfortably up on both consensus, for 0.2%, and the previous month's revised 0.2% uplift. Year-on-year, industry production was unchanged.
US services activity expanded again in June, according to separate surveys from S&P Global and the Institute for Supply Management, though both pointed to only modest growth and lingering cost pressures. S&P Global's services PMI rose to 51.2 from 50.7 in May, marking a third consecutive month of expansion. The firm said stabilising economic conditions helped lift new business at the fastest pace since February, supported by new project wins and demand linked to the FIFA World Cup. Domestic demand strengthened, but export orders fell for a seventh straight month amid uncertainty over tariffs and government policy.
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