WITH British dealers starting the day after a near record rise on Wall Street, there was only one way for London to go yesterday.

Footsie opened at a new intra day high of 4,096.4 and the latest economic data on the current account deficit gave no cause for upset as traders jostled for position ahead of derivatives expires at 10.30 am.

All the indices sailed effortlessly through the choppy waters of double witching expiry of British index options and Footsie futures. They coped equally well with the eagerly awaited US triple witching, which included the expiry of individual stock options.

Then, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average built on Thursday's 126.8 point gain with a rise of 68 points in the first 15 minutes of trading, London reached for the sky.

The blue chip index moved forwards smartly to touch the short term holy grail of the most upbeat strategists 4,100.

The effort to reach that level proved too much, however, and Footsie slipped lower during the next couple of hours.

Footsie ended the day 26.3 higher but still at a new peak of 4,077.6, beating the previous record set in late October by just four points.

The FT-SE Mid-250, which is less exposed to the rise and rise of Wall Street because the stocks in, the index tend not to be traded internationally, lifted 41.6 to 4,448.4.

But it remained more than 100 points adrift of the 4,568.6 peak achieved in April.