The City's attention continued to focus on euro trading today in a session set for few corporate announcements and little economic news.

The euro made progress against the pound overnight but slid marginally against the yen and dollar as the Japanese currency continued its dangerously strong progress.

The Nikkei stock index made its second successive heavy fall as the yen's strength showed no signs of abating.

The FTSE 100 Index gained 13.7 points to 5893.1 in early trading with few clues coming from Wall Street where the Dow Jones Industrial Average remained virtually unchanged.

Dealing remained very thin as investors continued shrugging off the New Year hangovers at this traditionally quiet time of the year.

Marginal gains were seen on most of the smaller stock indices although the FTSE 250 slipped as pockets of profit taking causing some minor damage.

Far East linked stocks caught the Asian cold with HSBC down 8p to £15.75, Cable & Wireless down 8.5p to 765p and Standard Chartered down 8.5p to 675p.

Hays fell 11.5p to 481p as dealers blanched at a £16m deal to buy courier company France Partner group across the Channel.

Colt Telecom continued its meteoric rise gaining 57p to £10.10 amid further positive sentiment for Telecom's stocks.

BT gained 16p to 955p, Telewest Communications jumped 5.5p to 191p and Vodafone put on 11p at £10.60.