Tuesday 06 May 2014 2:41 am

What you need to know before the open

Markets are expected to open slightly higher this morning, following Asian counterparts, which have gained on encouraging US data out yesterday.

Although Wall Street saw a more solid finish, European stocks fell yesterday as worries over Ukraine rumbled on and weak Chinese data led investors to shy away from risk.

Corporate news

Barclays has announced a near-50 per cent plummet in pre-tax profit in its investment banking unit in the first quarter, to £668m, with income down 29 per cent.

Aberdeen Asset Management has said tougher emerging markets conditions have hit profit and revenue, with underlying pre-tax profit down three per cent to £217m in the six months to the end of March.

Lafarge, the cement giant, saw a quarterly loss of €135m in the first quarter, from €117m a year earlier.

AstraZeneca’s had its Epanova drug, part of its cardiovascular medicines portfolio, approved by the US Food and Drug Administration.

And UBS has said it’s revamping its corporate structure, launching a share swap into a newly-formed holding company, intended to make it easier to break it up in a crisis. It’s offering a special dividend to shareholders of at least 0.25 Swiss francs per share, to entice them into swapping.

Data in focus