PARIS (Reuters) – The main European stock markets are heading up on Thursday morning with the help provided by the Swiss central bank to Credit Suisse but the trend remains volatile as the European Central Bank (ECB) must make its decisions on rates during the day.

In Paris, the CAC 40 took 1.33% to 6,977.27 points around 08:45 GMT. In London, the FTSE 100 advances by 1.19% and in Frankfurt, the Dax gains 1.14%.

The EuroStoxx 50 index rose by 1.27%, the FTSEurofirst 300 by 0.95% and the Stoxx 600 by 0.83%. The volatility index on the Stoxx 600 fell by 7% but remained at a high level, around 30 points.

Futures contracts on Wall Street are also pointing to a recovery with an increase of 0.19% for the Dow Jones, 0.24% for the Standard & Poor’s 500 and 0.46% for the Nasdaq.

Credit Suisse, which sowed panic on the markets on Wednesday amid fears of insolvency, announced overnight that it could borrow up to 50 billion Swiss francs (50.6 billion euros) from the Swiss National Bank (SNB).

The title Credit Suisse, which lost Wednesday at the close of nearly 25% to 1.697 Swiss francs, to its lowest level in history, rebounded Thursday from 22.33%. The main French banks, Crédit Agricole (+1.93%), BNP Paribas (+2.40%) and Société Générale (+1.86%) regained a very small part of the ground lost on Wednesday, while the European index banks down 6.92% the day before, resumed 2.26%.

In other corporate news, TotalEnergies advanced 2.05% after the announcement by the Canadian group Alimentation Couche-Tard, a time interested in a merger with Carrefour (+ 1.07%), of exclusive negotiations in to acquire assets of the French energy giant for 3.1 billion euros.

Regarding monetary policy, the ECB statement is expected at 13:15 GMT. The institution committed in February to raising its rates by 50 basis points this month, but since the rout of the banks, uncertainties have dominated over the ECB’s ability to keep this commitment.

According to analysts, the ECB is now torn between its desire to bring inflation back close to its 2% target and the need to ensure the stability of financial markets, with its credibility also at stake.

“Unless the ECB sees the outlook for inflation significantly different from a week ago, anything other than a 50 basis point hike would be a big mistake and damage its credibility,” said Piet Haines. Christiansen, economist at Danske Bank.

The money markets currently assess the probability of a 50-point rate hike by the ECB at 50%, the day before this probability had fallen to less than 20% and it was 80 before the setbacks of Credit Suisse. The probability of a rate hike limited to 25 points is estimated at 42%.

(Written by Claude Chendjou, edited by Kate Entringer)

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