(BFM Bourse) – Reassured by the prospect of a summit between Biden and Putin, the Paris market started the week off on the right foot on Monday morning, before falling back significantly after the Kremlin deemed it “premature” to hold a such meeting. The CAC 40 has already lost 1.5% since opening.
After its 5th negative weekly performance over the last 6 weeks amid fears of an imminent invasion of Ukraine by Russia, the Parisian market is falling further as the Kremlin blows heat – but above all cold – on the diplomatic evolution of this explosive situation. While the Elysée announced on Sunday night that Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden had “accepted the principle” of meeting at a summit, proposed by Emmanuel Macron, Moscow dampened the optimism born of this possible meeting, judging “premature to speak of a summit”.
“There is an agreement on the fact of having to continue the dialogue at the level of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs [mais] talking about concrete plans to hold summits is premature,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. until the moment an invasion begins”. “We are also ready to inflict rapid and severe consequences if Russia chooses war” she also added. In short, nothing very reassuring. Especially since the Russians accused the Ukrainians of firing a shell at a border post, which the Ukrainians denied.
Faced with this particularly tense situation, investors are therefore once again opting for caution, and the barometer of the Paris market yields 0.8% shortly after 12 p.m., abandoning the threshold of 6,900 points (to 6,874 points). Note that the day’s session takes place in a reduced volume of transactions, Wall Street remaining closed on Monday because of “President’s Day”, corresponding to the commemoration of the birth of George Washington.
The CAC 40 is thus not benefiting from the publication, this Monday morning, of a “flash” PMI indicator of private sector activity in France, which came out well above expectations in February (at 57.4, the highest since June 2021, against a consensus of 55.5). At 57.9, the component measuring activity in services comes out more than 4 points above analysts’ estimate (53.6) and “at a 49-month high” notes Alexandre Baradez, head of the market analysis at IG France.
A season of results at the end
Business-specific activity dried up somewhat on Monday after a prosperous week in annual publications, generally positive from the tricolor flagships (Kering, Schneider Electric, Carrefour or even Teleperformance). After having taken almost 5% on Friday in reaction to its convincing results, the latter made almost all of this progress this Monday at midday (-4.1%, the largest drop in the CAC). URW (-2.8%), Schneider Electric and L’Oréal (-2% each) also declined significantly. On the other side, the movements are much less pronounced, Eurofins Scientific and Carrefour dominating the list at this stage with gains of… 0.4%.
On the rest of the rating, the annual results of Forvia (ex-Faurecia) are freshly welcomed, the equipment manufacturer having notably announced a 2nd consecutive net loss, despite the confirmation of its ambitious objectives for 2025. After an opening up more than 3%, the title fell by the same amount around 12:20 p.m. Air France – KLM also reduced its lead but remained in the green at midday (+1.7%) while The echoes argue that the Dutch state, Delta Airlines and China Eastern would be ready to participate in its recapitalization.
The former member of the CAC Worldline resumed almost 3% at the opening after the announcement of its entry into exclusive negotiations with Apollo on the sale of its terminal activities, before returning close to balance.
Scotland supports Valneva
The Franco-Austrian biotech Valneva for its part grabbed nearly 1% while the Scottish economic development agency has shown its desire to support it over the long term, both in the manufacture of vaccines and in its research activities.
In terms of oil, the prices of the main world crude oil benchmarks stagnated on Monday at the start of the session, after having generally lost ground during the past week, in particular against the backdrop of a possible return to the Iranian oil market. The barrel of Brent is trading at 91.3 dollars around 12:5 p.m. (-0.1%). On Forex, the single currency regained 0.27% against the greenback at 1.1352 dollars.
Quentin Soubranne – ©2022 BFM Bourse