Broad gains push FTSE upwards

HSBC rose 12.5p to 817p. The Wall Street Journal said the shares rose after the Chinese lender Bank of Communications agreed to sell as much as 20% of its shares to the bank. Sage, a maker of accounting software, advanced 3.25p to 184.5p. ITV climbed 1.5p to 111.5p. In Asia, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 index rose 163.59 points to 11,744.15 earlier today, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng advanced 285.19 points to 12,134.96. On Wall Street, trading ended up yesterday as the Dow Jones Industrial Average index gained 84.50 points to 10,479.57 by the close. The S&P 500 index ended up 9.65 points...