Firm. Welcome to countdown, everybody. I am anna edwards. Manus i am manus cranny. They warned us, saying the problems would be tough, dropping around 50 less. Let us bring you the first news. First have sales coming in at 3. 7 2 billion, that is down 11. 4 , a little bit less than will the market was perhaps expecting. 353he operating profit, million swiss francs, that is down 53. 6 annually. They expect the results close or equivalent to last years, with that kind of pressure, this was last week, the stop dropping 14 on the day. The drop in profit they expected it to be twice what the analysts had expected. It is all about switzerland. Anna lets stick with the corporate thing. Firsthalf sales rising by 5 , and roche confirming the forecast of interest, analysts say first half sales will be 20. 5 billion swiss francs, a touch above the estimate of 24. 8 billion swiss franc. And at 7. 7 swiss francs versus the estimate of 7. 64. A look ahead of estimates. Looking in particular for Blad
Lufthansa cuts profits, unilever breaks. We hear from the ceo in just a few minutes. Is not in the office in berlin. Shes outside the ecb in frankfurt. What are going to be the highlights today . The highlights are going to be the questioning, the barrage of questioning. Its damp in frankfurt and in terms of policy changes; its expected that the ecb will hold fire, wait until september, wait until it can read the tea leaves of the way the economy has been potentially hit by brexit. There will be questions about the impact of brexit, the slow down on the eurozone, the questions on the 80 billion euros of bond buying. Yields far below the deposit rate. What can they actually get their hands on at the moment . And of course, there will be questions about his hometown, italy, and the banking crisis there. The light of brexit shining on the italian banking concerns. Guy yeah. Another tough press conference for mario draghi. If he thought he would get a nice, relaxing one, turns out brexit a
Johnson joining us from our european headquarters. Headline number for me unchanged. Guy they will keep the they purchase facility are saying they do not have enough information to make a decision at this stage. Maybe at the beginning of august we may see a rate cut. Sterling has picked up on the back of that, no rise to see what is happening. We will have to wait a few more weeks before we get that decision. Everybody waiting to see what will happen. I do not know a reflection of whether they believe a rate cut will have zero impact on the u. K. Economy, or want to see the effect of the brexit referendum story will have. It a stronger pound, kneejerk reaction in the fx market, yields higher off the back of the 10 year gilt yields around 0. 7 . Is this to do with a lack of data . All we have is a confidence survey. A bit of data but not much. Sentiment about consumer there are not much indications that some businesses are delaying investment and hiring, some signs pretty brexit vote st
The lowest Unemployment Rate in over one decade and wages rising. This morning, i had meetings others inagues and addition to my duties in this house i shall have further meetings later today, this afternoon, i will travel to berlin to be chancellor merkel to discuss how we implement the decision the british people took any referendum and i expect we will cover a number of other pressing International Issues and tomorrow i will visit paris with similar discussions with their president. Can i warmly welcome the Prime Minister . Minister,the prime given her unwavering commitment to deliver economic stability and National Security in our United Kingdoms interest, that she welcome mondays vote in this house for the program . That ensures economic stability and National Security remain the Guiding Principles of her tenure ship tenure ship . Can i think my honorable friend for his kind remarks and can i join them in enthusiastically welcoming the vote that was taken in this house to renew ou
Band of volumes also down across the 20 day moving average. This is where we are. They have not changed much throughout the course of the last 3, 4, 5 hours. The dow on the negative side of the flat line. See u. S. Gdpd numbers for Second Quarter, in less than expected, 1. 2 versus 2. 5 . We are seeing that reflected in the s p over the last trading session. Camethat u. S. Gdp number out, you can see the s p dipped around the 9 30, 10 00 a. M. Mark. A little past noon, we saw this hit an intraday record. Now we are just about four points off of that. We can see volatility, earnings taking hold. Lets take a look at what has been happening in terms of two of the biggest lists on the s p, those are in the tech sector. Alphabet and google up by 4 . It crushed estimates for the Second Quarter in terms of profit and revenue. Ad revenue went gangbusters, 19. 1 billion in the Second Quarter. The most ever since it started reporting. Amazon. Com of 7 10 of 1 . Revenue from its Cloud Service gro