Europe close: Stocks close near session highs
Europe's main stockmarkets ended the session higher with the notable exception of Spain's Ibex 35 following the violence-marred illegal referendum held in Catalonia at the weekend, as the region's leaders chose the path of provocation even after the courts had ruled it was unconstitutional.
By the closing bell, the benchmark Stoxx 600 was 0.51% or 1.97 points ahead to 390.13, alongside a rise of 0.58% or 73.79 points to 12,902.65 for the German Dax and an advance of 0.51% or 114.87 points in Italy's FTSE Mibtel to 22,811.19 .
In parallel, the Ibex 35 was down by 1.21% or 125.80 points to 10,255.70, with stock in Catalan lenders Banco Sabadell and Caixa Bank at the bottom of the pile, albeit with that of Madrid-based Bankia not far behind.
Meanwhile, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Spanish Treasury note ended near its highest level of the session, trading up by nine basis points to 1.70%.
Linked to the above, euro/dollar was 0.58% lower to 1.1744.
Over the weekend, the regional authorities in Catalonia pushed ahead with an illegal referendum on independence, which resulted in roughly 800 people having to seek medical assistance as Spanish police sought to close some polling centers before voting began.
About 2.0m Catalans cast their ballot in favour of independence, out of a total of 2.3m who voted and roughly 5.0m eligible voters.
As set out in their recently approved Law of Secession, according to Catalan officials a declaration of independence might be announced in coming days, even as the central government comes under pressure from some corners to suspend the region's autonomy and call fresh regional elections.
However, other voices in Madrid were calling for an attempt at dialogue.
Commenting on the implications of those events, Angel Talavera, senior Eurozone economist at Oxford Economics, said: "the escalating tensions are slowly being felt in financial markets. However, we are not revising our forecasts, given the strength of the Spanish economy and that some political tensions have already been priced in.
"But with the possibility of a negotiated settlement to the Catalan independence issue looking increasingly remote, we reiterate our view that the political tensions will continue to be felt across Spain for a prolonged period."
On the economic front, IHS Markit's euro area factory sector purchasing managers' index was marked down from a preliminary reading of 58.2 to 58.1.
Separately, Eurostat reported that the rate of unemployment in the single currency bloc was unchanged in August from the month before, at 9.1% (consensus: 9.0%).
Deutsche Bank acquiesced to paying $190m in order to settle legal claims against it in the States for rigging foreign exchange market prices.
RTL Group was planning to keep its full-year dividend at €4 a share, Boersen-Zeitung reported.