Normally a five-four result means that England have lost to Germany on penalties, but yesterday it meant that the UK had narrowly escaped an interest rate increase.
The minutes of the latest Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee meeting, held on August 2nd/3rd, showed a narrow five-four vote in favour of leaving rates unchanged. The minority members argued that rates should be increased by a quarter of a percentage point, and even some of the majority believed the decision was finely poised.
But news of the vote failed to stop the FTSE 100 index continuing its steady advance towards the top of its recent trading range. The bluechip benchmark closed 56.5 ahead at 6,532.0, its third gain of the week.
The effect of the minutes was offset by the average earnings numbers, which showed that the underlying rate of growth had slowed to 4.1 per cent in June from 4.6 per cent in May. However, the tightness of the labour market was illustrated by the 22,000 fall in unemployment, taking the percentage rate down to 3.7 per cent, its lowest level since 1975.
Markets seemed inclined to take the view that the data published since the MPC meeting, including retail prices and average earnings, had been sufficiently benign to rule out an interest rate increase in September.
Wall Street did not give much of a lead to the London market, in spite of the release of consumer price figures broadly in line with expectations. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was modestly lower and the Nasdaq Composite modestly higher by the time London closed.
At the sector level, there was further strength in the oil stocks after Tuesday's 10-year high in the crude price. And technology stocks had a good day; Sage was Footsie's best performer and the Techmark 100 index gained 55.36 to 3,603.01.
Small and medium-sized stocks did not keep pace with the FTSE 100. The FTSE 250 gained just 5.9 to 6,899.4 while the SmallCap rose 13.4 to 3,434.3.
Technical analyst Mr Brian Marber said Footsie had broken out of its trading triangle, which implied a move to 6,850. But a close above 6,550 would also mean it had broken out of a longer-term diamond pattern, which implied a move to new highs, possibly as much as 7,600. The Dow is also headed for highs, he believes.
Corporate news was fairly light. Reckitt Benckiser, the AngloDutch consumer products group, was the second-best performer in the FTSE 100 as it reported better-than-expected second-quarter results.
