(CercleFinance.com) – The European stock markets are recovering (+1.3% in London, +0.9% in Frankfurt and Paris), after showing a certain disappointment on Thursday in view of the ECB’s comments at the end of its monetary policy meeting.
Unsurprisingly, it has decided to leave its key rates unchanged for the moment. Above all, ‘the ECB has signaled that a rate cut in June is likely, but has not committed to the pace of subsequent cuts’, emphasizes UBS.
‘The ECB will maintain a data-driven approach to appropriately determine, on a meeting-by-meeting basis, the degree and duration of restrictive stance, and will not commit in advance to a particular rate path’ , she explained.
Operators now seem to be placing their hopes in company results, with César Perez Ruiz, head of investments and CIO at Pictet Wealth Management, judging that ‘positive announcements would encourage a recovery in stocks’.
It is in fact this Friday that American banks like JPMorgan Chase must kick off the results season. On average, S&P500 companies are expected to report a 3.2% increase in profits in the first quarter.
If an improvement in company accounts were to indeed materialize, stocks should benefit since this would justify an increase in prices on the basis of unchanged valuation ratios.
For the moment, Société Générale is in the lead in Paris (+4%), hailed for an agreement for the sale of activities in Morocco, the day after that for the sale of SGEF, ‘one of the many steps necessary to a revaluation’ according to UBS.
Copyright © 2024 CercleFinance.com. All rights reserved.
Did you like this article ? Share it with your friends using the buttons below.
