* US April non-farms better than expected but March revised down * Tsipras trys to sell Greek deal to Syriza MPs * UK petrol prices to fall? * Brexit will ‘stall’ City, Goldman Sachs chief warns * European markets fall as oil price weighs on shares * M&S appoints Archie Norman as new chairman 4.22pm BST After the recent falls on worries about oversupply and the (lack of) effect of the producers’ attempts to cap suppliers, oil prices are heading higher again. Brent crude is now up 1.9% at $49.32 a barrel having fallen as low as $46.64. Chris Beauchamp, chief market analyst at IG, said: Oil prices have bounced this afternoon, recovering a significant portion of yesterday’s heavy losses, but other than a snap-back rally in an overstretched market there is little sign of a firm fundamental reason. 4.07pm BST Over to Greece now. With another vote looming over painful pension cuts and tax increases – the price of emergency bailout loans to avoid default – the Greek prime minister has been busily trying to sweeten the pills today telling his own leftist MPS that the end of austerity is in sight.Helena Smith reports from Athens: It has been four days since Greece cut a preliminary agreement with creditors that paves the way to disbursement of loans in return for more painful reforms and which should open the door to debt relief. In theory all 153 MPs in prime minister Alexis Tsipras’ two-party coalition will also support the measures when put to parliament for vote on May 16. But disaffection is mounting in the ranks of Tsipras’ own Syriza party with many leftists openly questioning the wisdom of applying measures that will not only deepen Greece’s debt deflationary cycle – and in so doing aggravate a depression now longer and deeper than that suffered in the US in the 1930s – but further impoverish those already hit hardest by the crisis. “When the time comes, the government will hand out … what will be left after having exceeded its [primary] surplus [targets],” he said. The preliminary agreement, to be complemented by further talks in the coming weeks, is expected to be harshly debated before the vote takes place. Measures include a 13th pension cut of as much as 18% and abolishment of tax breaks that will broaden the tax base. Continue reading...
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