Market news round up, upgrades & downgrades courtesy of Cantor Index

UK Corporate Announcements

Greene King details 18 week LFL sales gained 5.1% despite the poor summer weather, and states that the Olympics had minimal overall impact

DS Smith states that trading since end April has been in line with its expectations and that its EPS growth remains on track

Ashtead Group states that it sees the full year materially ahead of the expectations, as it details a Q1 pre-tax profit of £61.4m from £33.8m and revenues of £325m from £268m

Genus announces a full year adjusted pre-tax profit of £54.4m from £40.8m on revenues of £341m from £310m

McBride states that trading since the year end has been in line with its expectations

Johnson Service announces H1 revenues of £126m and an adjusted pre-tax profit of £6m

UK Market News

The FT writes that around 10 groups have shown an interest in buying JJB Sports

In sport Rory McIlroy overturned an early significant lead by Oosthuizen to win the Deutsche Bank Championship in the US PGA Tour, keeping him as the world’s number one golfer and his third PGA win this year. The field was the top 100 in the FedEx Cup standings. The BMW Championship will have the top 70, then in a few weeks the top 30 play for the FedEx Cup and the $10m dollar bonus

The UK government handles a reshuffle today, while the UK press details how both Cameron and Osborne were booed by sections of the crowd yesterday as they handed out Paralympic medals

The new head of the FSA is expected to detail in a speech tomorrow that the regulator will ban the commission led sale of financial products

UK Analyst Upgrades

Colt Group Rated New Neutral At Nomura; Pt 145.00P

Petrofac Raised To Outperform Vs Neutral At Credit Suisse

UK Analyst Cuts

Land Securities Cut To Neutral Vs Buy At Ubs

Next Cut to Underperform from Neutral at Exane

Sage Group Cut to Underperform from Neutral at Exane

Segro Cut To Neutral Vs Buy At Ubs

Wood Group Cut To Neutral From Outperform At Credit Suisse

Wood Group Exits Credit Suisse Small & Mid Cap Focus List

Major European Companies Reporting

Partners Group Holding AG, S1, 0,  Elekta AB, Q1, 1.07,  BioMerieux, S1, 2.03,  Ashtead Group PLC, Q1, 0.06

European Market Summary

The FT writes on how EU authorities are suggesting moves that major European firms will need to have 40% of their non executive director roles filled by women by 2020 or face fines

The same paper details how Spanish business have been paying the highest bank borrowing costs for over 4 years, while German peers are paying record low levels

Moody’s has cut its outlook on the EU to negative citing risks to Germany and France and the UK

Sources suggest that ING is pushing prospective buyers of Hong Kong and Southeast Asia operations to also buy part of its Japanese unit

Greece is due to sell €875m in 181 day bills at 11:00

S&P 500 Companies Reporting

Campbell Soup Co, Q4, 0.379

S&P 500 Ex Dividends (gross):-  Newmont Mining Corp, NEM, (.35),  Principal Financial Group Inc, PFG, (.21),  Interpublic Group of Cos Inc/The, IPG, (.06)

US Market News

The US markets come back from the extended weekend today and which is traditionally seen as the end of the summer lull in volumes

Canadian based Valeant Pharm has agreed to buy Medicis Pharm for $2.6bn

The lockup period blocking AIG from selling its $7.6bn stake in AIA Group ends today

Bernanke responds to ‘new normal’ talk and states that he sees little evidence of substantial structural changes in recent years, after some have stated in recent weeks that the high 8.3% unemployment rate is likely to stay permanently elevated

Overnight Market News

As expected the RBA has left rates unchanged overnight, and states that terms of trade has remained higher than expected

Goldman cuts back its outlook for Corporate China, reducing its forecasts for growth to 1.8% in 2012 and 8.6% in 2013, from 6% and 12.35

In order to boost liquidity in Nikkei Volatility Futures the exchange is reportedly looking at maker-taker pricing, which would pay the supplier of bids and offers and charge those that takes the prices

FX Summary

The euro has strengthened a little further against the yen on hopes that the Draghi news this week will be positive, and will include the much heralded moves on ECB bond buying

Commodity Summary

Gold has moved up to five month highs, as the dominant story remains the expectations of QEIII ahead

Economic Data Due

00:01 UK August BRC Sales, 0.1% previous

09:30 UK August PMI Construction, 50.9 previous

15:00 US August ISM Manufacturing, 50.0 exp. 49.8 previous

Economic Events

Van Rompuy meets Merkel in Berlin

Monti meets Hollande

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