9:30AM The UK benchmark index is slightly down in spite of a strong opening.

The UK benchmark index is lower in mid-morning trading on Friday. The FTSE 100 was down 20.5 points at 6,551.0.

Advancers

BT Group was the leading advancer in the FTSE 100 stocks. The telecommunications group gained 1.3% as its chief executive said that analysts were too pessimistic about the prospects for revenue growth of the telecom provider. Falling sharply this week after a profit warning, lender Northern Rock, rallied 1.3% while oil stocks were also stronger. Royal Dutch Shell gained 1.2% and BP added 0.8%.

Down in the market, mid-cap Berkeley Group surged 1.1 per cen as the housebilder posted a 14% increase in annual profits. Another mid-cap, Sports Direct International, gained 1.6% after the retailer announced the $135 million purchase of Everlast, most famous for making boxing equipment.

Decliners

Real estate stocks kept their losing streak on worries about increasing interest rates and the US subprime mortgage market. Segro declined 4.2%, Hammerson shed 4% and Liberty International declined 2.8%.

8:30AM Asian markets finish mixed with Japan higher and China, HK lower.

Asian markets ended mixed on Friday. In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 Average ended 1.2% higher at 18,138. Toshiba firmed up 3.9% and Takeda Pharmaceutical advanced 1.5% on strong sales guidance. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index shed 0.8% to close at 21,772. HBSC declined 0.7%, and China Mobile was down 1.1%, leading the decliners. Oil stocks finished mixed despite higher oil prices, as Cnooc finished up 0.6%, but Sinopec lost 0.8% and PetroChina was off 0.9%.

In China, the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index dipped 2.4% to settle at 3,820. Insurance group Orient Group declined by the daily 10% limit, China Life Insurance lost 4% and Shanghai International Airport shed 4.3%. South Korean Kospi Index also declined 0.5% to 1,743. Hyundai Mipo Dockyard lost 2.7% and Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering shed 4.6%. In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 index advanced 0.2% to 6,274. Resource stocks advanced with Alumina rising 2.8%, BHP Billiton ending up 0.4%, and Rio Tinto advancing 0.4%.

7:30AM NY-6:30PM Mumbai Sensex zooms 146 points on a large-cap rally.

The Sensex on BSE finished 145.94 points higher, or 1.01%, at 14,650.51, just 73 points away from its all-time intra-day high of 14,724.

The market-breadth was very strong as there were 1,484 stocks which advanced, 1,107 which declined and 90 which were unchanged. Of the 30 stocks in the Sensex, 22 advanced, while the rest declined. The turnover on BSE was Rs 4,817 crore, slightly lower than Rs 4,848 crore on Thursday. On NSE, the turnover was Rs 10,681 crore, much lower than Rs 12,193 crore on Thursday.

Economic news

The wholesale weekly inflation rate decreased to a 13-month low as prices of food and cereals dropped. Wholesale prices advanced 4.03% in the week ended June 16 from a year earlier, down from 4.28% in the previous week, beating analysts’ expectations for 4.13%.

The Indian rupee advanced 0.2% to 40.765 against the dollar in morning trading in Mumbai. It has risen 6.7% this quarter, the best performance among ten of the most traded Asian currencies. The rupee advance is according to investors due to the booming economy and strong market attracting a lot of investment from abroad.

Trading highlights

SBI was the most active stock with a turnover of Rs 154.80 crore followed by GMR Infrastructure and Reliance Industries.

Advancers

Reliance Energy zoomed nearly 6% to Rs 614. Reliance Energy’s subsidiary Rosa Power Supply, on June 26 2007 took out long-term loans of around Rs 2,000 crore for the first stage of its 600 MW power project. HDFC Bank soared nearly 5% to Rs 1,144. Other banking stocks also rose. ICICI bank rose 1.3% to Rs 955 and the State Bank of India, advanced 3.7% to Rs 1,523. SBI surged as reports circulate that the bank intends to launch a private equity fund with a corpus of $1 billion.