Market numbers: Friday 19th August 2011

The FTSE 100 index of leading UK company shares finished the week at 5,040.76, down 51.47 points or -1.01% on the day and down 279.27 points (-5.25%) over the week.

Extreme levels of volatility returned to global stock markets in the final part of this week, with the FTSE 100 dipping below 5,000 points earlier in the day before finishing down only 1%.

The biggest daily fallers were energy and engineering stocks, with fears that a slower global economy recovery would reduce demand for their products. The banks were also hit hard due to their exposure to the eurozone debt crisis.

Autonomy was by far the best performer today, rising 72% to end the day at 2,483p. This followed news of a £25.50 a share acquisition bid from Hewlett Packard which wants to focus on its original market of software development.

Over a year the FTSE 100 has fallen from 5,211.30 (down 170.54 points or -3.27%).

£1 is currently worth $1.64940 US or €1.14600 Euros.

Brent Crude Oil Futures is currently priced at $108.49/barrel. Gold is $1,848.00/ounce and Silver is $41.98/ounce.

The UK Bank Rate is 0.5% and CPI inflation was 4.4% for the year to July 2011.