(News Bulletin 247) – The Paris Bourse has been on a faultless course since Monday. With a gain of 1.1% at the close, the CAC 40 posted a fourth increase in a row, driven by a slowdown in inflation in two member countries of the euro zone.

Always higher. The Paris Stock Exchange continues a fourth session of increases in favor of a slowdown in consumer prices in Spain and Germany in March. Investors therefore expect price dynamics to be weaker across the Eurozone as a whole as well. Verdict tomorrow.

In the meantime, the CAC 40 posted a gain of 1.06% to 7,263.37 points at the close to return to a few fractions of its level prevailing before the outbreak of the banking crisis. For now, the flagship index is on track to post a rise of more than 10% since the beginning of the year.

Inflation at the center of attention

As the situation in the banking sector is much calmer than a week ago, inflation and monetary policies now focus the attention of operators. Investors are “starting to focus on this type of thing again [les données de l’inflation]“and no longer on the banking crisis, underline the analysts of Deutsche Bank quoted by AFP.

In Spain, price dynamics have clearly calmed down. Inflation slowed more than expected in March to 3.3% year on year in March after 6% in February. In Germany, the rise in prices slowed to 7.8% over one year after 9.3% in February, in harmonized data which serves as a reference for the European Central Bank.

These two tangible signs of the decline in inflation militate for a slowdown in prices throughout the euro zone. The PCE price index in the United States, which is the Fed’s favorite measure in its assessment of price dynamics, will also be on the agenda for this last session of this third month of the year.

Traders took notice in the afternoon of a surprise rise in jobless claims in the United States last week to reach 198,000 as well as a slight downward revision in the growth of the American gross domestic product (GDP) of the fourth quarter at 2.6% compared to an earlier estimate of 2.7%.

Banks and technologies at the top

In the absence of bad news, the banking sector continued to rebound. At the top of the CAC 40, we find Societe Generale (+3.2%), BNP Paribas (+2.2%), Axa (+1.8%) and Crédit Agricole (+1.2%).

Tech stocks followed the same pace with the appeasement of the bond compartment. Dassault Systèmes gained 3.2% while Capgemini appreciated 2.9%.

The defenses lagged behind. Red lantern, Sanofi yielded 1.6% followed by Danone (-0.8%).

Excluding the flagship index, Orpea has put an end to its descent into hell for the time being and rebounded by more than 13% on Thursday.

Casino takes up 6.8%. Distribution Casino France, a subsidiary of the distributor, has announced that it has increased its stake in Smart Good Things, Tony Parker’s company.

On the side of the foreign exchange market, the euro resumed 0.5% to 1.0900 dollars. Oil prices remain on the upside, driven by signs of increasing US demand with the unexpected drop in US inventories last week and the halt in Iraqi oil exports. A barrel of Brent from the North Sea for delivery in May rose 0.9% to 78.32 dollars, while a barrel of American WTI for the same maturity rose 1.4% to 74.01 dollars.