(News Bulletin 247) – The Paris Bourse closed once again down, with a CAC 40 down 0.4% on Tuesday evening. The latest economic data published on both sides of the Atlantic leaves the way open for central banks to continue their interest rate hikes.

The Paris Stock Exchange continues its slow slide after moving to historic highs last week. The CAC 40 lost 0.37% to 7,308.65 points the day after a decline of 0.16%.

The Parisian place is more than resisting while on Wall Street, the resumption of trade is more difficult after a long three-day weekend. The three major indices lost more than 1% at the close the day after the President’s Day holiday.

More aggressive central banks?

The latest statistics published on both sides of the Atlantic indeed fuel the prospect of a continuation of interest rate hikes, whether on the side of the European Central Bank or its American counterpart, the Federal Reserve. American.

In the United States, economic activity is showing resilience . The composite PMI unexpectedly rose to 50.2 in February, to an eight-month high and up from 46.8 in January. The consensus was more pessimistic and expected a level of 47.5.

Earlier in the day, market operators also learned of an activity index in the euro zone that was higher than expected for the month of February.

The composite PMI index (which takes into account global activity) exceeded market expectations, with an indicator at 52.3, the highest for nine months. Remember that a figure of 50 marks the border between an expansion and a contraction of activity.

“While price pressures eased again in February, the survey nevertheless highlights continued strong inflationary pressures in the services sector, due in particular to higher wage costs. leaders of the European Central Bank, this trend, combined with the acceleration of growth, is likely to argue in favor of a further tightening of monetary policy in the coming months”, also explained Chris Williamson, economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence.

The ZEW index, which measures investor confidence in Germany, also rose to 28.1 in February, above the figure of 22 expected on average by economists.

In addition to tensions in the monetary chapter, geopolitics is again inviting itself into the stock market debates a few days before the first anniversary of the outbreak of the Ukrainian conflict. Russian President Vladimir Putin reiterated his wish on Tuesday to continue his military campaign in Ukraine.

In this environment, which is not conducive to risk taking, bond yields are tending. The interest rate for the 10-year US loan reached 3.925%, against 3.82% the day before. The yield of the 10-year French exceeds 3% while it was evolving around 2.9% on Monday.

Engie at the top of the CAC 40

Sensitive to the direction of interest rates, tech stocks suffered particularly on Tuesday. On the CAC 40, Worldline lost 3.9% after publishing disappointing margin forecasts, Capgemini lost 2.8% despite results deemed convincing by analysts. Excluding the CAC 40, Atos returned 5.8%, while the TCI fund is headwind against Airbus taking a stake in a future Atos subsidiary. Sopra Steria, for its part, gave back 2.1%.

Going against the trend, Engie finished at the top of the CAC 40 (+4.8%) after publishing annual accounts that exceeded expectations, driven by gas and electricity prices.

Edenred rose 1.2% as the workplace payments specialist posted above-expected growth for the fourth quarter of 2022.

Excluding publications and large caps, TheraVet soared 67% after signing an exclusive distribution agreement with Vetpharma for the distribution of the Biocera-Vet product line in five continents.

On other markets, the euro fell 0.2% against the dollar to 1.0666 dollars. Oil contracts are falling. The contract on Brent from the North Sea for delivery in April, yielded 1.2% to 83.05 dollars a barrel while that of the same expiry on WTI listed in New York was down slightly by 0.1% at $76.47 a barrel.