Updates from Toyota, Alent and WPP

Some cheer for shares on Friday with the FTSE 100 climbing more than 1% to 6,444. Travis Perkins shares rose more than 5% to 1939p while Shire was up 4.4%. There was also a 4.3% climb for advertising giant WPP, up 4.3% to 1480p as well as useful upticks from Burberry and Aberdeen Asset Management. More dismay though for Pearson, down 5.2% to 900p.

In the US the Dow surged 157 points to 17,646.7 helped by a 10% surge in the value of Microsoft shares thanks to much-strong-than-expected revenues. P&G shares were up almost 3%, helped by better profits news also.

We stay with WPP for a third quarter trading update first: reported revenues rise 5.9% to £2.92bn though its down 1.6% at $4.53bn thanks to currency squalls. WPP reports like-for-like net sales growth of 3.3%, stronger than 2.3% in the first half.

The headline mixed numbers reflect the continuing weakness of the pound against the dollar says WPP, more than offset by the strength of sterling against the Euro (and other currencies).

"Operating profits," says the company, "were well ahead of last year and net sales operating margins on a constant currency were up 0.5 margin points, well above the Group's full year margin target of 0.3 margin points improvement."

Next, chemicals supplier Alent. In a trading update Alent says its principal electronics and automotive side was slightly slower than anticipated in the first half of 2015, and this trend continues in the third quarter.

Group level net sales value at constant currency was cut 2.9% in Q3 2015, a decrease of 3.5% on a reported basis, to £100.7m (Q3 2014: £104.3m).

"In a declining market," said Alent in a statement, "we believe we have grown market share. We are now seeing the expected improvement in the second half of the year reflecting the normal seasonal cycle in electronics."

Lastly, Toyota hangs onto its best-selling car maker crown for the first nine months of the year. Toyota sold almost 7.5m cars, down 1.5% on last year.

Close competitor VW sold 7.4m cars while GM sold 7.2m. Last year Toyota sold 10.23m cars in total. Recently Toyota said it expects to see the near extinction of conventionally fuelled vehicles by the year 2050.

The Japanese car maker is increasingly betting on fuel cell technology as well as hybrids. It is hoping to sell 30,000-plus fuel-cell vehicles a year by 2020. Meanwhile VW is facing an onslaught of costs: lawsuits, repair costs and fines.