London Session - September 4, 2009 5:32 AM

The better tone in stocks has ensured a preference for risk this morning. However, conditions remain fairly lacklustre ahead of this afternoon’s US August non-farm payrolls release. Trichet’s comments this morning served to underline his cautious tone which was clearly evident in his speech at yesterday’s ECB press conference and these sentiments have been reiterated by comments from the ECB’s Weber that ‘huge uncertainties’ remain as the slump bottoms out. Given that Treasury Secretary Geitner has also this week made clear the view that it is too early to implement exit policies, the market is taking a fairly pragmatic view ahead of this weekend’s G-20 Finance Ministers meeting in London. It is accepted that exit strategies will be discussed but there is likely to be no rush to change the policy status quo after these meetings. Full text »