By Rob Arkwright, Hargreave Hale & Co THE FTSE 100 has moved above the 6500 point level this week, following steady gains from the oil and banking sector and also a handful of technology stocks.

BP Amoco and Shell Transport received a boost following rising crude oil prices. Crude reached a 10-year high of $32 a barrel, which resulted in the oil giants adding 17 points to the index.

Among the banking sector, ongoing speculation of further consolidation has continued to lift the likes of Abbey National and Alliance & Leicester.

There have been mixed fortunes on the telecoms front, with British Telecom hitting a 20-month low of 780p. This is due to the current mobile auctions in Germany. The bids for Germany's third generation mobile phone licences have reached £29 billion, which is already far more than the £22.5 billion the British Government raised for our licences.

BT and Vodafone are bidding for German licences through their respective local ventures, Viag and Mannesmann. Analysts fear they may have greatly underestimated the amount of money raised by the auctions. Vodafone's share price, however, has remained fairly steady. Rumours are also circulating over possible takeovers of Telewest and Thus, both of which have fallen drastically over recent months.

Among technology stocks, Geo Interactive Media, the video compression specialist, has seen a good rise this week. This is following speculation that Ericsson, the world's third-largest handset maker, is in talks with Samsung on a tie-up to produce low-end handsets in Asia. As Geo already licences and co-develops software with Samsung, a deal with Ericcson would be a major coup.

Stocks dealing in semiconductors have also been active this week, due to claims from US analysts that the booming worldwide chip market is far from over. Both ARM Holdings and Bookham Technology have seen a volatile week as a result.

Finally, in the transport sector, P&O, the shipping operator, which has recently seen its cruise division suffering, has received some optimism over its bulk and container shipping operations.

A report that shipping rates have hit a 30-year high has resulted in various brokers, including Merrill Lynch, upgrading their stance on the stock. This has boosted its share price.