11:49 AM EDT, 10/06/2026 (MT Newswires) -- London shares traded higher for the third consecutive session on Tuesday, with the FTSE 100 up 0.43% at close, as crude oil prices declined and Britain's construction sector downturn eased. Brent oil dropped as Axios reported that US President Donald Trump's top national security aides deliberated over the future trajectory of the Iran conflict during a meeting at Camp David. Additionally, Bloomberg News said Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline was operating normally, contrary to an earlier report from AFP regarding the pipeline's suspension due to an attack. Britain's construction sector contracted at its slowest pace since January in September, with downturns in residential, commercial and civil engineering activity easing. The seasonally adjusted S&P Global UK Construction PMI rose to 46.1 from 44.3 in August, exceeding the consensus estimate of 45. "Latest data indicated that overall input price inflation softened for the fourth month in a row, but this trend seems unlikely to endure given recently escalating fuel prices and transportation costs," S&P Global Market Intelligence Economics Director Tim Moore said. Meanwhile, UK Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey told the country's biggest banks that the government is facing a difficult fiscal picture ahead of the Budget later in October, London's Financial Times reported, citing people familiar with the discussions. The chancellor is said to have met with executives from Barclays (BARC.L), HSBC Holdings (HSBA.L), Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY.L), NatWest Group (NWG.L), Nationwide Building Society (NBS.L) and Santander UK (SANB.L). Separately, the UK government named Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, NatWest, Morgan Stanley and RBC Capital Markets as joint lead managers for the pilot issuance of the country's digital gilt instruments, expected in the first quarter of 2027. The banks will handle areas including underwriting, investor outreach and distribution of the digital gilts. Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds and NatWest gained 0.17%, 0.84%, 1.73% and 0.69%, while Nationwide and Santander UK declined 0.59% and 0.23%, respectively. In other news, publishing, business intelligence, and exhibitions group Informa (INF.L) jumped 2.70% after agreeing to purchase B2B live events company Clarion for an enterprise value of 2.24 billion pounds sterling and reviewing options for its Taylor & Francis academic markets division. "Analysts and investors have been advocating for a strategic focus on B2B events for a long time, given that Informa did not fully extract the value of its publishing business as RELX and Wolters Kluwer did, resulting in a lower valuation due to a sort of holding discount. The move was becoming more obvious post-Covid as the perspectives of the B2B Events business materially improved, with an organic growth rate nearly doubling," lphaValue/Baader Europe said. "Based on peer valuation (Wiley and Springer Nature), we think Informa could fetch c.GBP3bn in [enterprise value] terms out of this asset."

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