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STOXX 600 ends up 0.9%
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Industrials, consumer staples firm boost index
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Defence stocks rise in India's plan to triple exports
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Sweden's Castellum drops to the bottom of STOXX 600
(Updates to market close)
By Shreyashi Sanyal and Amruta Khandekar
Feb 13 (Reuters) - European shares rose on Monday as
focus turned to inflation data from the United States due later
in the week, while defence stocks jumped on news of India aiming
to triple its defence exports.
Broad-based gains helped the pan-European STOXX 600 end 0.9% higher, with shares of Swedish defence equipment maker
SAAB jumping 7.4% to the top of the index.
Shares of Thales , Airbus and Rheinmetall rose between 1.3% and 2.5% after India said it wants
to more than triple its annual defence exports to $5 billion by
2024/25 as it looks to ramp up domestic manufacturing.
The STOXX aerospace and defense index rose 1.9%.
All eyes are now on U.S. inflation numbers on Tuesday, which
would provide more clarity on the outlook for future interest
rate hikes from the U.S. Federal Reserve.
European shares posted their first weekly decline in three
on Friday, with hawkish rhetoric from a number of Fed and
European Central Bank (ECB) officials dousing investor hopes
that the central banks would soon end their aggressive rate
hiking cycle.
Still, the STOXX 600 has risen 8.7% so far in 2023 on the
back of better-than-expected earnings and a brighter outlook for
the euro zone economy.
"Europe has just had such strong positive momentum that
traders right now are are willing to think in terms of the
positive, not the negatives," said Steve Sosnick, chief
strategist at Interactive Brokers.
"A lot of it is relief because so much negativity had been
priced in, in terms of energy prices, in terms of inflation and
Europe dodged a huge potential problem by having warm weather
this winter."
Euro zone economic growth is likely to be stronger than
expected this year while inflation will be lower than in
forecasts made towards the end of 2022, the European Commission
said on Monday.
All major bourses in Europe rose, with London's blue-chip FTSE
100 up 0.8% and hitting its record closing level.
Industrial stocks were a big boost to the STOXX 600
on Monday, rising 1.3%, while gains in consumer staples firms
such as Unilever and Nestle also supported the
index.
Limiting the advance, Stockholm-listed Castellum slid 5.7% as the company unveiled plans for a rights issue and
its board did not propose a dividend.
Credit Suisse dropped 4.8% after logging its
biggest weekly loss since November in the previous session.
Sanofi fell 1.2% after the French drugmaker
announced its global head of research and development has
decided to step down.
(Reporting by Shreyashi Sanyal and Amruta Khandekar in
Bengaluru; Editing by Subhranshu Sahu, Savio D'Souza and Mike
Harrison)
