London’s stock markets swung higher on the back of reports claiming Russian President Vladimir Putin said there were “positive shifts” in talks with Ukraine, which his forces invaded two weeks ago.
Meanwhile the price of oil returned to its upward climb, but remained well short of its 13-year high from earlier in the week.
Brent crude rose by 2.54% to $112.11 per barrel when the London markets closed.
Early strong gains across global markets following the report on Putin’s comments pulled back slightly as traders became more tentative, but still helped the FTSE close higher.
The FTSE 100 ended the day up 56.55 points, or 0.8%, at 7,155.64 points on Friday.
Chris Beauchamp, chief market analyst at IG, said: “It’s a strange world where markets rally on comments from the Russian president but that’s what happened during the session today.
“Putin’s hint that negotiations might be showing some progress was enough to engender a rally across markets, although some of the optimism has been trimmed.
“There is, as yet, no sign of any real deal emerging and Russia’s previous aims still appear to be in place, so this rally might go the way of so many others of late, with markets still unable to find the foundations for a sustainable bounce.”
Meanwhile, sterling gained slight traction against the euro following positive gross domestic product (GDP) figures for January.
The measure increased by 0.8% over the month, as the economy shook off the impact of Omicron before Russia invaded Ukraine weeks later.
It wiped out the 0.2% drop seen in December, and means that GDP is actually 0.8% above its pre-pandemic level, the Office for National Statistics revealed.
Although it is unlikely the economy out of the woods, as it will have to deal with the inflation shock exacerbated by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The pound decreased by 0.17% against the dollar to 1.306, and rose 0.1% against the euro to 1.194.