10 things you need to know before European markets open

Here are the 10 major things you need to know in markets this morning.

Cameron triumphed. David Cameron's Conservative party is set to be by some way the largest party in the UK House of Commons, with something very near to an actual majority. Scotland has been swept by the SNP, winning all but 3 of the 59 seats, and Labour have been hammered.

The pound surged. As results have rolled in, the British pound has exploded higher against the dollar, rising as much as 2% from its lows in the middle of yesterday to around $1.55.

Monsanto made a huge offer to buy a Swiss rival. The world's largest GMO company reportedly wants to buy another huge agribusiness, Bloomberg reports. Monsanto, best known for its patented genetically modified seed products and pesticides, has apparently submitted a $45 billion (£29 billion) bid for Switzerland-based Syngenta, a company that produces crop chemicals.

German industrial production is coming. The figure for March will be out at 7 a.m. London time (2 a.m. New York time). Analysts are expecting a 0.4% bounce month-on-month.

Microsoft doesn't seem interested in Salesforce. Microsoft currently is not weighing an offer for Salesforce, two people familiar with the matter said on Thursday, dampening speculation that Microsoft could be drawn into bidding for the cloud software company.

Chinese exports tumbled in the year to April. China's exports fell 6.2% year-on-year in April to 1.08 trillion yuan (about $174 billion), official customs data showed Friday, a further sign of weakness in the world's second-largest economy.

Asian shares are mixed. The Shanghai Composite Index is down 0.06%, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng is up 0.42% and Japan's Nikkei is up 0.79%.

Hutchinson Whampoa is selling a one-third stake in its UK mobile phone business. Hutchison Whampoa has agreed to sell a one-third stake in its British mobile phone business for $4.3 billion (£2.78 billion) to a group of investors including Singaporean and Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth funds.

Uber is bidding for Nokia's mapping arm. Ride-hailing service Uber has submitted a bid for Nokia Oyj's map business, HERE, for as much as $3 billion (£1.94 billion), the New York Times reported, citing people with knowledge of the offer. Finland's Nokia said last month it had started a strategic review for HERE, a competitor to Google Maps, after announcing a takeover of network equipment rival Alcatel-Lucent.

Germany's foreign minister is prodding Russia for a further peace deal on Ukraine. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier called for a swift resolution to the Ukraine conflict on a visit to Volgograd on Thursday, expressing hope a peace deal agreed in Minsk would enter its "next phase".