Economics / Markets

Monetary Policy Committee inflation hawk Andrew Sentance has once again voted for a rise in UK interest rates.

UPDATE 12pm: The FTSE 100 index has climbed almost 1.6% in morning trading after strong late gains overnight on Wall Street.

The Chancellor will have no power to solely remove the head of the independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), George Osborne has pledged.

George Osborne and Vince Cable fear rationing of lending to small firms could reverse the recovery.

BP has begun to offload assets aimed at raising cash to pay for the Gulf of Mexico disaster, agreeing the $7bn sale of fields in the US, Canada and Egypt to Apache.

The UK's overall GDP growth forecast is at "significant risk" if business investment is not as robust as the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) predicts, ministers warn.

Public sector net borrowing hit £14.5bn in June, marginally below the shortfall of £14.7bn one year earlier but still worse than economists had expected.

Goldman Sachs has angrily defended itself against a public campaign claiming the bank is exacerbating global food crises through its commodity trading operations.

Sterling hit a seven-week low against the euro yesterday as the single currency shrugged off Ireland's ratings downgrade and continued concerns on Hungary.

The FTSE 100 opened down 0.37% or 19.09 points to 5,139.76 as Friday's sell-off on Wall Street dragged the index lower.