Morning Markets: FTSE boosted by Cadbury bid

The FTSE 100 is being spurred forwards by Cadbury this morning on news the British chocolate maker has received a £10.2bn takeover approach from US goods giant Kraft.

After just over an hour of trading, the blue-chip index was up 52.94 points (1.09%) to 4904.64, while Cadbury – which has rejected the merger proposal – has soared 38.03% to 784p. Food and consumer goods providers Unilever and Premier Foods have also enjoyed gains of 2.96% to 1670p and 8.72% to 46.51p respectively. Meanwhile, Associated British Foods has climbed 3.51% to 840.5 points following strong trading so far in this half of the year and the forecast of an improvement in adjusted earnings over the full year. In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 finished today’s trading up 133.83 points (...