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Yesterday's increase in the price of oil helped BP, Royal Dutch Shell and BG Group add between 0.7 per cent and 1.2 per cent this morning, Reuters reports.
Stronger metal prices helped Xstrata, Eurasian Natural Resources and Kazakhmys climb by up to 1.7 per cent and, at 09:01 BST, the benchmark index was up 0.5 per cent on 5,772.11 points.
Its increase mirrored the rise seen on the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300, which was up to a fresh 18-month high of 1,098.83 points earlier in the day.
Banks were higher in London following reports Wall Street turnaround specialist Wilbur Ross is backing Virgin Money's attempts to purchase the branch network of Royal Bank of Scotland and Hargreaves Lansdown analyst Keith Bowman was quoted by the news agency as saying: "The market's still enjoying somewhat of a tailwind from the positive US data that we've had over the weekend."
Posted by Clive Arneil
