Leading shares edged lower in opening deals as investors cashed in on the bullish start to the New Year, but ongoing bid talk surrounding Cable & Wireless and a broker upgrade to Amvescap helped to limit falls, dealers said. At 8.15 am, the FTSE 100 index was down 9.8 points at 5704.8 with the broader indices mixed. Meanwhile, in the US, the S&P 500 set a four-and-a-half year closing high, after Fed remarks hinting at an end to interest-rate rises powered a second day in a row of gains. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed 32.74 points higher at 10,880.15, while the Nasdaq rose 19.72 points to 2,263.46. And today investors will scrutinise the latest weekly jobless claims and December ISM services data to gauge the health of the world's biggest economy. Investors expect new claims for state unemployment benefits to fall by 1000 to 321,000 for the week ending December 24.