FTSE rally belies weak shopping figures

The FTSE 100 rallied this afternoon, following earlier falls as new data showed a further slowdown on the high street.

Trading was generally tepid following the release of new official figures, showing that retail sales were 0.4 per cent down in September.

The index closed at 4074.11, 33.22 points, or 0.82 per cent, up on the day.

UK investors are anticipating the release of new GDP figures from the Office for National Statistics tomorrow – which are expected to show negative growth for the last quarter.

Barry Ritholtz, director of equity research at Fusion IQ, told the BBC: "The market is coming to grips, after being in denial for so long, with a global recession, and to our eyes, we''ve thought we''ve been in recession for just about a year now."

He added: "Now the question is, is this going to be a more serious recession, is this going to be deeper, longer, more prolonged than previously expected."

Earlier in the day, Asian stocks had closed sharply down.

The FTSE''s small rise has also been mirrored on Wall Street, with the Dow Jones index trading 2.07 per cent up at 16:30 BST.