Investors should have increasing confidence in a UK economic recovery as the housing market shows strong signs of bottoming, Richard Woolnough believes.
The FTSE 100 opened 0.5% down as banks fell on news Qatar's sovereign wealth fund had sold stock in Barclays.
Invesco Ltd, the parent company of Invesco Perpetual, will acquire Morgan Stanley's retail asset management business for $1.5bn.
Rathbones has agreed to acquire up to £1.27bn in private client funds from Lloyds Banking Group for a cash consideration expected to be about £35.4m.
Fidelity has received investor approval to merge its £30m MultiManager Distribution fund into its £127m MM Income vehicle.
Schroders is launching a new platform for Ucits hedge funds, designed to provide easy access for the growing investor appetite in the space.
Standard Life has named group finance director David Nish as successor to group chief executive Sir Sandy Crombie from 1 January 2010.
Financial stocks are struggling this afternoon following Bank of America's announcement it suffered a $1bn (£612m) net loss in Q3.
The number of finance professionals setting up their own investment management businesses is growing, according to Laven Partners.
Aegon has let go four members of its European equity team as part of a restructure which will also see the departure of the group's sales and marketing director Jon Bennett.