RBS, Lloyds and Standard Life share prices rise as investors get giddy over Scottish No vote
What a difference a week makes. Just a few days ago, the likes of RBS, Lloyds and Standard Life were all threatening to move south of the border in the event of a no vote, on the grounds that an independent Scotland would be too shaky to operate properly in.
But today, investors showed their relief at the outcome of the vote, pushing up the share prices of all three banks.
While RBS' share price rose more than three per cent in early morning trading, Lloyds' rose two per cent and Standard Life rose just over one per cent.
Other companies with exposure to Scotland also benefitted: wealth manager Aberdeen Asset Management rose 1.2 per cent, while St James' Place rose four per cent.
Nick Beecroft, a senior market analyst at Saxo Bank, said "many were predicting [a yes vote] could have been the 'butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon jungle' that led to the long-awaited crash in equity markets and rise in volatility that has been curiously absent over the course of this summer".
The converse is therefore now true; with this tremendous source of uncertainty removed, equity markets can resume their upward March, driven on by excess global liquidity- the US Federal Reserve may be turning off the taps, but the Bank of Japan is flooding the markets with money and the European Central Bank is moving inexorably toward quantitative easing.