12.14pm BST

The main events today so far have been the flurry of PMI releases.

First we had the HSBC China manufacturing PMI which showed improvement in the sector and fuelled hopes that the world's second largest economy is stabilising.

That was followed by surprisingly weak PMI figures from France, which showed both the services and manufacturing sectors shrank in August.

There was far better news from Germany, which boasted better than expected PMIs and the strongest manufacturing activity in more than two years. The upbeat data drove European markets higher.

The news got better when Markit's PMI index was published for the eurozone as a whole, showing the region's private sector is the healthiest in more than two years.

Britain's car industry continued on a winning streak with a 7% rise in the number of vehicles built in the UK in July according to the SMMT.

Yields on 10-year German bonds hit the highest level since March 2012 as investors turned away from safe haven assets after the flurry of upbeat data.

Jeroen Dijsselbloem, leader of the Eurogroup of eurozone finance ministers, admitted Greece will need another bailout next year.