Economics / Markets

House prices in the UK rose by 1.8% in October compared with the previous month - but this followed a big drop a month earlier, the Halifax said.

DeAnne Julius, former Bank of England policymaker, and Sir John Gieve, ex-deputy Governor at the Bank have openly opposed another round of quantitative easing.

The FTSE had climbed significantly by lunchtime after positive results from a number of major companies.

The government's spending cuts and the rise in VAT to 20% in January will result in more than 1.6 million job losses across the public and private sectors, research suggests.

Positive earnings reports from some of the FTSE 100 top players have boosted the index this morning.

The FTSE 100 opened positively in a week set to be dominated by a slew of US economic and political news.

The US federal reserve could pump up to $1trn of extra QE into the economy to battle unemployment and encourage growth.

The US economy grew at a 2% annual rate in the third quarter, faster than in the previous three months.

Germany has agreed to give the EU's €440bn (£383bn) bail-out fund permanent status rather than letting it expire in 2013 as planned.

A poor session in Asia this morning and unconvincing display on Wall Street overnight weighed on the FTSE 100 as it opened four points down at 5,673.