Markets: FTSE 100 starts the week lower

• FTSE 100 down 1% to 6,722
• Gold up 3.83% to $1,212.09/oz
• £/$ - 1.5730

FTSE 100

Tullow Oil was once again under fire, falling 6%. Travel stocks were also under fire. Cruise operator Carnival fell 4.5%, InterContinental Hotels fell 3.8%, and TUI Travel was 3% lower.

In European markets, the Paris CAC 40 fell 13 points to 4,377, and the German Xetra Dax lost 17 points to 9,963.

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In the US, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.3% to 17,776, the S&P 500 lost 0.7% to 2,053, and the Nasdaq Composite was 1.3% lower at 4,727.

Overnight in Japan, the Nikkei 225 and the broader Topix each rose 0.4% to 17,663 and 1,427 respectively. And in China, the Shanghai Composite jumped 3.1% to 2,763 and the CSI 300 gained 3.7% to 2,923.

Brent spot was trading at $72.22 early today, and in New York, crude oil was at $68.47. Spot gold was trading at $1,200 an ounce, silver was at $16.18 and platinum was at $1,215.

In the forex markets this morning, sterling was trading against the US dollar at 1.5715 and against the euro at 1.2636. The dollar was trading at 0.8041 against the euro and 118.85 against the Japanese yen.

And today, Aviva has agreed the terms of its £5.6bn takeover of smaller rival Friends Life. The deal will create Britain's largest life insurance company, with 16 million customers. Both companies' share prices were up in today's early trading Friends life by 2%, and Aviva by 0.2%.

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