LONDON: World stock markets eased back on Friday (Feb 17) as a Trump-fuelled surge fizzled out, but London gained in an end-of-week flurry of excitement prompted by a Kraft Heinz bid for Unilever. “After a five-day running streak markets are looking a bit tired,” said Jasper Lawler at London Capital Group, adding that losses were light so far and “no justification for alarm”.
Wall Street fell, as did Paris, while Frankfurt ended the day unchanged with strong Allianz results helping the Dax index off its earlier lows. But London posted closing gains as Unilever shares surged, topping the day’s winners, after the Kraft bid which the Dutch company rejected. Dutch-British giant Unilever, whose main listing is in London, saw its stock rise by 13.6 per cent by the close. Kraft Heinz said it had made an offer to Unilever to merge both companies, creating a leading consumer goods company. But Unilever turned down the bid, saying the US$143 billion offer “fundamentally undervalues” the company, and that it saw no basis for further talks.
