Spending Review: No shocks for markets or sterling

At 1.57pm, the FTSE100 lost some of this morning's gains but was still marginally up 0.01% or 0.61 points to 5,704.50 as investors digested George Osborne's speech.  However, banks were hit after Osborne said details of legislation to introduce a permanent tax levy will be published tomorrow. RBS declined 1.75% to 46.13p, while HSBC was down 0.34% to 70.26p and Barclays dipped 0.02% to 288.8p. Meanwhile, sterling edged up against the US dollar during the speech although it had fallen to a near-four month low against the Greenback earlier today after Bank of England meeting minutes ...