If it's Friday, and the market is moving higher, it must be time for some bid speculation.
Sure enough, traders were hearing talk of a possible £25 a share Chinese offer for BG, which has helped lift the gas giant 42p to £13.55. A deal at that level would value the group at around £85bn. A takeover of BG is by no means a new tale, with China's CNOOC mentioned in the past as one possible predator. A variation of the story recently had BG selling part of its Brazilian operations to a Chinese company.
Meanwhile heading in the other direction is commodities trader Glencore, down 6p at 429.7p on suggestions that Goldman Sachs was undertaking a placing of a $175m convertible bond. Glencore has been rumoured to be about to lend around $800m to Indonesian group Bakrie to help it refinance debt. This would give Glencore more marketing rights on coal produced by Bumi, the miner controlled by Bakrie.
