Morning Call by Traders University

The FTSE 100 closed 93.2 points up at 4189.6, held higher by a positive open on Wall Street.
Banks helped push the FTSE 100 index firmly into the black yesterday as airlines hit by swine flu fears regained some of their losses. Part-nationalised Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group drew positive comments from HSBC brokers, while British Airways was up almost 4% after falling for two days. RBS was the leading blue-chip stock, up more than 12%, closely followed by Lloyds.
Stateside, the Fed confirmed that the recession is starting to ease. At the end of a two-day meeting yesterday, Federal Reserve policymakers said that while the economy is still receding, the pace of decline “appears to be somewhat slower” than the last time they met in mid-March.
Major indices, which had already been up sharply ahead of the announcement, posted gains of more than 2 percent. The Dow Jones industrial average jumped 169 points to its highest close since 9 February. The Dow is now 25 percent above its early March lows, though stocks have been unsteady over the past several days on fears of a potential swine flu pandemic and persistent concerns about the country’s biggest banks. In Forex news today: At 1:30pm CAD GDP m/m and USD Unemployment Rate. Expected to be slightly better, watch out for volatility if the results are worse or much better.