© Reuters. THE STOCK EXCHANGES OF THE EURO AREA END DOWN
by Blandine Henault
PARIS (Reuters) – stock markets of the euro area have accelerated their decline on Thursday by end of the session, with the continuous rise of the single currency against the dollar to close the net decline in a market that is overall not very active at this time of the end of the year.
In Paris, the CAC 40 ended down -0,55% to 5.339,on 42 points and in Frankfurt, the German Dax gave -0,69%.
The index EuroStoxx 50 has dropped -0,73%, the FTSEurofirst 300 has dropped 0.39 units% and the Stoxx 600 has lost -0,26%.
For its part, the Footsie british resisted (+0,03%), thanks to the support provided by the progression of values in mining which has offset the progress of the pound against the greenback.
More generally, the dollar is down -0,45% against a basket of reference currencies, to its lowest level since the beginning of the month.
“The u.s. currency to fall in reaction to the decline in Treasury yields and a rebalancing of the portfolio in volumes that are very low in fine,” notes Andrea Tueni, an analyst in markets at Saxo Bank.
The yield on Treasuries to 10 years fell to 2,407% Wednesday, while he was earlier beyond of 2.47%, before returning Thursday around 2.42%.
The decline of the dollar boosted the euro to a peak of 1,1954 dollar, to a high of more than a month.
This inflation of the single currency has in particular affected the values of european exporters like Airbus (PA:AIR) (-1,57%), Safran (PA:SAF) (-1,47%) or LVMH (PA:LVMH) (-1,41%) in Paris.
Conversely, AccorHotels (PA:ACCP) has finished at the head of the CAC 40 (+1,59%) after the announcement of negotiations with a group of French investors and international in view of the sale of a portion of the capital of his pole real estate AccorInvest.
THE COPPER STILL GOES UP
Elsewhere in Europe, Banco BPM has climbed 2.07%, the fifth biggest increase in the Stoxx 600, after saying Wednesday that its rate of own funds exceeded the regulatory requirements of the european central Bank (ECB) to 2018.
The sector of basic resources (+0,36%) is still distinguished, always supported by the increase in the price of metals, in particular copper which benefits from expectations of strong demand from China in 2018.
The standard contract of copper on the London Metal Exchange rose 0.7 percent, moving not far from a high reached since January 2014.
“The funds are engaged in a frenzy of buying, but the timing and the power of the movement is surprising”, leading Peter Fertig, consultant at Quantitative Commodity Research.
To the values, mining groups such as Rio Tinto (LON:RIO) (+1,54%), BHP Billiton (LON:BLT) (+0.9%) and Anglo American (LON:AAL) (+0,88%) were also able to sign the largest increases in the FTSE 100.
On the oil market, crude prices have reacted only briefly to the announcement of a stronger-than-expected oil stocks last week in the United States.
The barrel of Brent is moving on a note to be stable, at 66,44 $ and the barrel of the light crude, american crude oil (WTI) fell slightly, to 59.59 dollars.
(with Pratima Desai, edited by Benoit Van Overstraeten)
