Europe open: Stocks slip at the start of trading; geopolitics in focus
European shares were on the backfoot at the start of Friday's, taking a cue from the mixed close to trading on Wall Street overnight amid profit-taking and ahead of US vice-president Mike Pence's visit to Europe.
Allianz SE
€262.00
15:50 25/04/24
DJ EURO STOXX 50
4,989.88
00:00 25/04/24
FTSE 100
8,060.74
15:50 25/04/24
FTSE 350
4,425.32
15:50 25/04/24
FTSE All-Share
4,379.26
15:50 25/04/24
Media
11,669.63
15:49 25/04/24
Mediaset
€2.54
16:25 23/03/23
Sky
1,727.50p
16:34 06/11/18
Xetra DAX
17,883.00
15:50 25/04/24
At 0817 GMT the benchmark Stoxx 600 was edging lower by 0.01% to 370.06 alongside a dip of 0.03% for Germany´s Dax and a decline of 0.18% to 4,891.13 for the CAC in France.
Milan's FTSE Mibtel on the other hand was up by 0.08% at 19,106.80.
"Calls for tepid European start to the final session of the week come after a mixed close on Wall street as the Trump trade appeared to lose steam heading into a long weekend following a record run and rather lively presidential press conference. This morphed into a down day for Asia overnight despite the USD finding support to quell yesterday’s currency strength hindrance among peers (GBP, EUR, JPY), something that hampered equity sentiment yesterday," Mike van Dulken and Henry Croft at Accendo Markets said.
On traders´ radar, US vice president Mike Pence was scheduled to travel to Europe on Saturday.
He was expected to reiterate his country´s support for both Europe and NATO.
The economic calendar was light at the end of the week, with the sole economic indicators set for release the latest euro area current account data for the month of December, alongside Eurozone construction output figures for that same month.
The latest monthly UK retail sales numbers, due out at 0930 GMT, on the other hand did hold the potential to influence markets, especially in the forex arena.
German insurer Allianz was in the news after announcing late on Thursday it would hike its dividend following its solid 2016 results and launch a €3bn share buyback programme, albeit to the detriment of possible acquisitions after finding no suitable targets.
Contacts between Sky and Mediaset to purchase the Italian pay-TV unit of the latter were well-advanced, Il Sole 24 Ore reported.
AstraZeneca unveiled positive results from a Phase III clinical trial of its breast cancer treatment Lynparza.