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FTSE 100 close higher on Thursday

Xinhua, March 13, 2015 Adjust font size:

FTSE 100 Index, British benchmark stock market gauge, Thursday rose by 0.59 percent, or 39.56 points, to 6,761.07.

British deficit on trade in goods and services was estimated to have been 600 million pounds (or 9 million U.S. dollars) in January 2015, substantially narrowed from the five-year high of 2.1 billion pounds recorded a month earlier, said Office for National Statistics (ONS) Thursday.

Britain registered a 8.4 billion pounds deficit on goods trade, and an estimated surplus of 7.8 billion pounds on services in January, data showed.

Meanwhile, Eurozone industrial production fell 0.1 percent in January 2015 after a 0.3 percent rise in December 2014, the statistical office of the European Union said on Thursday.

AstraZeneca's share price increased by 4.05 percent, topping the gainers of the blue chips. CRH, Coca-Cola HBC AG, Diageo and SABMiller increased by 3.73 percent, 1.84 percent, 1.78 percent and 1.72 percent respectively.

Standard Chartered led the top losers of the blue chips with a share price drop of 4.44 percent, followed by Direct Line Insurance Group (2.73 percent), Royal Mail (2.70 percent), BHP Billiton (2.48 percent) and Dixons Carphone (1.35 percent).

The index has gained 3.94 percent so far this year when measured in U.S. dollar. Endit