Spending Review: No shocks for markets or sterling

UK equity markets and sterling were largely unfazed by today's Spending Review with investors unsuprised by the level of the cuts.

At 1.57pm, the FTSE100 lost some of this morning's gains but was still marginally up 0.01% or 0.61 points to 5,704.50 as investors digested George Osborne's speech.  However, banks were hit after Osborne said details of legislation to introduce a permanent tax levy will be published tomorrow. RBS declined 1.75% to 46.13p, while HSBC was down 0.34% to 70.26p and Barclays dipped 0.02% to 288.8p. Meanwhile, sterling edged up against the US dollar during the speech although it had fallen to a near-four month low against the Greenback earlier today after Bank of England meeting minutes ...