BUSINESS LIVE: UK wages shoot up; FTSE continues climb; De La Rue takeover;

Just before close, the FTSE 100 was 1.48% up at 8,254.55.

Meanwhile, the FTSE 250 was 1.39% higher at 19,241.52.

Lloyds Banking Group has relaxed its mortgage rules, meaning the typical household could potentially borrow £38,000 more.

The changes could boost borrowers’ budgets when taking a mortgage with any of the banks in the group: Lloyds, Halifax, Bank of Scotland and BM Solutions.

B&M expects annual profits to exceed the mid-range of guidance following new store openings and bumper trading in France.

The discount retailer, which will name its new chief executive ‘in the coming weeks’, now expects to post adjusted earnings before nasties of between £605million and £625million for the 52 weeks ending 29 March.

An 85-year-old alleged fraudster has been charged by the Financial Conduct Authority, accused of fleecing investors through a bogus scheme.

John Burford, whose investment activity was investigated by our columnist Tony Hetherington, is suspected to have generated more than £1million from fraudulent practices.

US stocks are trading marginally higher at the open in the US as investors mull the possibility of tariff relief for the auto sector after President Donald Trump floated the idea of more exemptions

The Dow is flat, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq are up roughly 0.1 per cent each.

(PA) – Just over a third of Britons think that diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies in the workplace have gone too far, new polling suggests.

An Ipsos poll for PA Mediapoint surveyed 1,200 British adults aged 15 to 75 about DEI in the workplace between March 28 and April 2.

It comes as businesses on both sides of the Atlantic continue to respond to the major pushback against DEI policies since US President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January.

The PA poll found that 36% of respondents believe current policies in UK workplaces have gone too far.

While 31% of respondents said DEI policies are currently “about right” and 19% say they have not gone far enough.

Respondents over the age of 55 were much more likely to say these policies had gone too far – at 47%, it found.

Reacting to the US administration’s actions to restrict DEI, just over a quarter of respondents said they approve of the move at 27%.

Donald Trump’s emerging trade war is another blow to the jobs market after a slowdown over the last year, the chief executive of recruiter Robert Walters has warned.

Toby Fowlston told investors on Tuesday tariffs will likely impact client and candidate confidence in the short term and were restricting his firm’s ‘visibility on the outlook for the balance of the year’.

It came as the recruiter revealed a large slump in revenues for the first quarter, as a continued global hiring slowdown drove double-digit declines in fees in every region.

Everyman Media Group was boosted by the release of the latest Bridget Jones film at the start of the year, the upmarket cinema brand said on Tuesday.

The group told shareholders ‘Mad about the Boy’, which reportedly surpassed £100million on the international box office at the end of February with almost half coming from the UK, was the driver of ‘positive momentum’ in the first quarter.