Business Live: Dimon calls on Fed to raise rates

Wall Street stocks bounced back on Monday after a top Federal Reserve official argued against raising interest rates quickly. Fed Governor Lael Brainard said the US central bank should adopt a "moderate and gradual" approach to lifting rates and avoid moves to "tighten policy pre-emptively".

Her remarks were in contrast to comments from more hawkish Fed officials last Friday that had led to a more than 2% drop in US stocks. 

At the closing bell, the Dow Jones was at 18,325.07, up 1.3%. The broad-based S&P 500 gained 1.5% to 2,159.04, while the tech-rich Nasdaq jumped 1.7% to 5,211.89. 

Oil prices rose on Monday despite a new forecast from Opec producing countries that supplies will increase in 2017. 

A barrel of West Texas Intermediate for October delivery rose 41 cents to close at $46.29 a barrel. In London, North Sea Brent rose 31 cents to finish at $48.32 per barrel for November delivery. 

Earlier on Monday, in its monthly market report, Opec revised its 2017 forecast for non-Opec oil supplies upwards by 350,000 barrels per day, indicating that, rather than contracting, supplies will now increase by 200,000 to an average 56.5 million barrels per day.  

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The Times reports that rail bosses are attempting to end the traditional scourge of leaves on the line - by zapping them with microwaves. The paper says trains are to be fitted with tiny devices at least 100 times more powerful than a domestic microwave oven, which will dry the track a fraction of a second before the wheels touch. It's one of a number of ideas being tried out - others include blasting rails with dry ice and using a magnetic braking system, which doesn't rely on wheels gripping the track. 

BBCCopyright: BBC

IMF chief Christine Lagarde will go on trial in France on 12 December over a state payout to tycoon Bernard Tapie made when she was finance minister, the court hearing the case has said.

Lagarde, 60, will be tried for negligence by the Court of Justice of the Republic, a tribunal that hears cases against ministers accused of wrongdoing in the discharge of their duties.

The case stems from Lagarde's handling of a dispute with Tapie, a businessman and former minister, who claimed he was defrauded by a state bank in its sale of sportswear giant Adidas in the 1990s.

Lagarde has strongly denied any wrongdoing.

"The criminals will typically gain access to a client’s email account, often through a phishing attack, and then contact an employee at the law firm asking them to transfer funds to a bank account."

US stocks are heading for their strongest session since July after Federal Reserve Board Governor Lael Brainard stuck to her dovish stance on interest rates and urged caution about removing monetary stimulus too quickly.

Wall Street, which fell heavily on Friday and continued the sell-off in early Monday trading, recovered strongly later. Traders said the chances of a rate rise when Federal Reserve policymakers meet next week looked less likely.

Brainard's speech followed earlier comments by Atlanta Fed Bank President Dennis Lockhart and his Minneapolis counterpart Neel Kashkari in which they suggested there was no urgency to raise benchmark US rates. 

With just over an hour of trading left, the Dow Jones is up 1.2%, the Nasdaq is 1.5% ahead, and the S&P rose 1.36%.

BBC New York business editor John Mervin tweets:

PACopyright: PA

More on Great British Bake Off now (we know you've been waiting). The BBC has just issued this statement:

Quote Message: Working with Love Productions, we have grown and nurtured the programme over seven series and created the huge hit it is today. We made a very strong offer to keep the show but we are a considerable distance apart on the money. The BBC's resources are not infinite. GBBO is a quintessentially BBC programme. We hope Love Productions change their mind so Bake Off can stay ad-free on BBC One."

Working with Love Productions, we have grown and nurtured the programme over seven series and created the huge hit it is today. We made a very strong offer to keep the show but we are a considerable distance apart on the money. The BBC's resources are not infinite. GBBO is a quintessentially BBC programme. We hope Love Productions change their mind so Bake Off can stay ad-free on BBC One."

Shares in ITV fell 3.2% today and are now down 28% since the start of the year. The network is rumoured to be the new home of the Great British Bake Off now that the BBC has lost the rights after the current series ends.

FT media correspondent David Bond tweets:

A week ahead of the Federal Reserve's latest rate decision, influential Federal Reserve board governor Lael Brainard has said the case for a hike is "less than convincing".

"To the extent that the effect on inflation of further gradual tightening in labor market conditions is likely to be moderate and gradual, the case to tighten policy preemptively is less compelling," Ms Brainard said, speaking in Chicago.

Ms Brainard has consistently voted to postpone increases in interest rates. 

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Wall Street titan Jamie Dimon says it's time for the US Fed to raise interest rates.

The boss of JPMorgan Chase thinks the economy is strong enough to handle a rate hike, which, if the speculation proves correct, could come as early as next week.

"Let's just raise rates," Dimon told an audience at the Economic Club of Washington, DC.

"I'd go sooner rather than later," he added, when asked if he thought the US central bank should raise rates at its policy meeting next week or wait until December. 

Blue OriginCopyright: Blue Origin

In case you're wondering how Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin rockets compare with others on the market, the Amazon billionaire has provided a handy picture guide. 

At 270 feet (82 metres) high for the two-stage New Glenn and 313ft tall for the three-stage version, the rocket will be taller than any on the market today, including Elon Musk's SpaceX's Falcon 9 (224ft).

New Glenn is dwarfed only by the Saturn V rocket (363ft tall) that propelled Apollo-era astronauts to the Moon in the 1960s and 1970s.

According to Reuters, NASA is working on a rocket called the Space Launch System that will be the tallest ever (384ft) and aims to ferry people to an asteroid and perhaps one day, even to Mars.

APCopyright: AP

Another tech billionaire is going into space.

Amazon's founder Jeff Bezos has unveiled a heavy-lift reusable rocket expected to compete against Elon Musk's SpaceX and other companies for commercial satellite launches before the end of the decade.

Bezos' Blue Origin space company is designing two versions of the rocket, named New Glenn, a nod to John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth and the last surviving member of NASA's original Mercury Seven astronauts.

"New Glenn is designed to launch commercial satellites and to fly humans into space," Bezos said in a statement.

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Such is the British appetite for venison - which many see as a healthier meat - that Scotland cannot produce enough of it, Quartz reports.

Customers at Sainsbury's bought 115% more deer meat in 2015 than in the year before, the site says, and the roughly 7,000 deer on Scottish farms aren’t nearly enough to meet demand. Currently most venison in Britain comes from Scotland, but soon up to half might need to be imported from places such as New Zealand. 

Not a great day on the FTSE 100. The index finished 1.12% down at 6,700.9 points. Associated British Foods was the big casualty, down 10.8% due to poor sales at its Primark chain. The FTSE 250 finished 0.92% down at 17,730 points.

HermesCopyright: Hermes

The chief executive of delivery firm Hermes has been on BBC 5live defending the firm against claims it pays some drivers below the minimum wage.

Carole Woodhead said the firm has a business model that provides great service for local communities. "Most of our couriers enjoy being self employed," she says.

Hermes does not pay its couriers minimum wage, she added. The firm pays couriers an average of £9.80 an hour after expenses, which was above the £7.20 compulsory National Living Wage.

As much as we don't like giving any free publicity to Ryanair here at Business Live towers (remember, other airlines are available), this quick-off-the-mark tweet did amuse us.

IHS Markit chief European and UK economist Howard Archer tweets: