- Stocks finish near day's best levels.
- Miners surge as Fed pledges low rates.
- IIF willing to accept coupon rate of below 4%

With gold prices jumping to a six-week high on the back of last night's statement by the US Federal Reserve, miners dominated the risers on London's FTSE 100, which closed up 72 points at 5,795, slightly off its intraday high of 5,806 (reached in late afternoon trade).

The Fed, which had previously said it would maintain the federal funds rate between 0% and 0.25% until mid-2013, announced yesterday that it intends to leave them as they are until late 2014. According to the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), "economic conditions - including low rates of resource utilization and a subdued outlook for inflation over the medium run - are likely to warrant exceptionally low levels for the federal funds rate at least through late 2014."

While the move fuelled a strong showing by US stocks last night, some noted that the decision reflected the central bank's concerns over economic growth: one economist from RBC Capital Markets (Tom Porcelli) was quoted as saying that "this drives home one important fact, the Fed is scared."

Meanwhile, talks in Greece are ongoing. The head of Institute of International Finance (IIF), Charles Dallara, is to meet with Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos in Athens again today to discuss a debt-swap deal. According to Greek newspaper Ethnos, the IIF is now willing to accept a coupon rate for new Greek bonds of 3.75%, despite earlier demands of a rate no less than 4%.

Elsewhere in the Eurozone, in a move which some are describing as the most significant since the country was frozen out of international debt markets last year, the Irish National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) yesterday offered to swap investors' holdings in the country's short-term debt. Some observers seem to believe that the move may benefit from the ECB's long-term refinancing operations.

MINERS JUMP AS FED PLEDGES LOW RATES

With the Fed pledging to keep rates low, the dollar dived against the euro, sending dollar-denominated commodities prices higher. As such, the miners were in demand iin London with Vedanta Resources, Polymetal International and Kazakhmys leading the way.

The big news of the day on the corporate front was concerning Polymetal International. Although now off its best levels of the day, up 4.77% (after previously rising over 9%), there has been rumours that Russian peer Polyus Gold and Polymetal's billionaire owners are considering merging the Russian gold miners to create the world's ninth-biggest producer of the metal.

Kazakhstan-based copper miner Kazakhmys rose after saying that it met all of its major production targets in 2011 and expects to maintain similar levels of copper output in 2012. Sector peer Anglo American was also higher after it said iron ore production in the final quarter of 2011 increased by 5% from a year earlier to 12.4m tonnes.

The banks were putting on a good show too with Lloyds, RBS and Barclays making gains. There was speculation today that US investment bank Jefferies is close to buying the RBS's corporate broking arm Hoare Govett.

FTSE 250 MOVERS: PETROPAVLOVSK, HOCHSCHILD SURGE

Russian gold miner Petropavlovsk jumped over 11% after it saw production over the whole of 2011 up by almost a quarter from 2010's levels. Sector Hochschild Mining wasn't far behind after the Americas-focused precious metals miner held a presentation to analyst and investors in London, in which it underlined its prospects for the coming years.

Budget airline easyJet jumped 10% after it reported a 16.7% increase in revenue for the quarter ended 31 December 2011, helped by higher seat prices and the absence of disruptive winter weather.

The worst performer was financial software provider Misys after it swung to a pre-tax loss of £3.6m in the first half, down from a profit of £18.8m the year before. "Misys has had a tough first half and left itself too much to do in H2. We anticipate downgrades today of around 10%," according to Peel Hunt analyst Paul Morland.

BC

FTSE 100 - Risers
Vedanta Resources (VED) 1,252.00p +8.68%
Polymetal International (POLY) 1,152.00p +7.76%
Kazakhmys (KAZ) 1,194.00p +7.28%
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 32.83p +6.14%
Randgold Resources Ltd. (RRS) 7,170.00p +5.05%
Rio Tinto (RIO) 3,893.00p +4.89%
International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (IAG) 180.00p +4.83%
Xstrata (XTA) 1,129.50p +4.68%
Fresnillo (FRES) 1,817.00p +4.25%
Wolseley (WOS) 2,274.00p +4.07%

FTSE 100 - Fallers
Carnival (CCL) 1,901.00p -2.16%
Sage Group (SGE) 301.20p -1.31%
Morrison (Wm) Supermarkets (MRW) 292.10p -1.22%
Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) 419.30p -0.62%
Imperial Tobacco Group (IMT) 2,253.00p -0.44%
SSE (SSE) 1,220.00p -0.33%
Vodafone Group (VOD) 174.00p -0.32%
Capita (CPI) 642.50p -0.31%
Pearson (PSON) 1,177.00p -0.25%
Essar Energy (ESSR) 135.70p -0.22%

FTSE 250 - Risers
Petropavlovsk (POG) 772.00p +10.84%
easyJet (EZJ) 445.50p +10.33%
Hochschild Mining (HOC) 515.00p +9.41%
Domino Printing Sciences (DNO) 618.50p +8.51%
Kesa Electricals (KESA) 71.35p +7.45%
Ferrexpo (FXPO) 351.10p +6.36%
PZ Cussons (PZC) 303.10p +6.35%
Lonmin (LMI) 1,109.00p +6.33%
AZ Electronic Materials SA (DI) (AZEM) 298.00p +6.31%
Mondi (MNDI) 533.00p +6.18%

FTSE 250 - Fallers
Misys (MSY) 305.30p -6.21%
PayPoint (PAY) 558.50p -4.53%
Carpetright (CPR) 607.00p -3.34%
Exillon Energy (EXI) 258.50p -2.08%
Mitie Group (MTO) 265.50p -1.85%
Homeserve (HSV) 293.60p -1.77%
Paragon Group Of Companies (PAG) 179.90p -1.42%
Filtrona PLC (FLTR) 381.00p -1.32%
Go-Ahead Group (GOG) 1,245.00p -1.27%
Telecom Plus (TEP) 654.50p -1.21%

Related share prices
Anglo American (AAL) share price
Barclays (BARC) share price
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) share price
Misys (MSY) share price
Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) share price
Petropavlovsk (POG) share price
Vedanta Resources (VED) share price
Kazakhmys (KAZ) share price
Hochschild Mining (HOC) share price
Polymetal International (POLY) share price