PARIS (Reuters) – The main European stock markets fell at the start of the session on Thursday the day after statements deemed offensive by Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.
In Paris, the CAC 40 lost 1.4% to 7,159.05 points at 07:22 GMT. In London, the FTSE 100 lost 0.94% and in Frankfurt, the Dax fell 1.17%.
The EuroStoxx 50 index is down 1.31%, the FTSEurofirst 300 1.05% and the Stoxx 600 1.21%.
Jerome Powell expressed Wednesday during a hearing in the House of Representatives the need to continue the fight against inflation, statements without surprise but which nevertheless dragged the equity markets into the red in Europe and the United States.
The Fed boss will be heard from 2:00 p.m. GMT before the Senate this time and he should not deviate from his remarks the day before.
“Clearly the Committee wants the market to understand that a hike will be discussed at the next meeting,” said Kevin Cummins, chief economist at NatWest Markets.
The other meeting of the day will take place at 11:00 GMT with monetary policy announcements from the Bank of England, which should continue to raise its key rate as the rise in prices excluding energy and food accelerated by 6.8% to 7.1% in May.
Economists polled by Reuters last week were unanimous in saying the BoE will hike its rate from 4.5% to 4.75%, a peak since 2008.
The decisions of the Swiss and Norwegian central banks on their rates are also expected during the day.
In corporate news, satellite operator SES is up 4.3% on the Paris Stock Exchange after announcing the end of discussions with rival Intelsat for a potential merger.
Electrolux lost 5.16% after information from the Bloomberg agency that Midea gave up buying the Swedish household appliance group, which was reluctant to conclude an agreement.
SES Imagotag’s listing is suspended after short seller Gotham City published a research note in which it found the technology group’s financial accounts to be “misleading, incorrect and incomplete”.
(Laetitia Volga, editing by Kate Entringer)
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