(News Bulletin 247) – The Parisian index lost ground at mid-session this Friday, weighed down by the fall of one of its top names, with the pharmaceutical group.

Severe market sanctions follow one another and the CAC 40 is suffering in this period of corporate results. The flagship index of the Paris Stock Exchange dropped 0.6% to 6847.33 points. Over the week, however, it remains up for the moment by 0.45%, helped by some nice surprises (Dassault Systèmes, Carrefour, STMicroelectronics and even Vinci saw their publications praised).

“The markets continued to suffer from the accumulation of uncertainties, with the persistence of high long-term interest rates,” underlines Sebastian Paris Horvitz of LBPAM. The market also continues to dissect Thursday’s announcements from the European Central Bank (ECB). The European institution, as expected, kept its key rates unchanged and its president, Christine Lagarde, explained that a discussion on cuts was “premature”.

“The announcement of a break from the ECB, even if expected, helped to relieve the bond market a little, especially as fears dissipated over a more rapid reduction in the institution’s balance sheet, particularly affecting to the PEPP (repurchases of ECB securities launched to support the economy in the context of the pandemic, Editor’s note), because the subject was not raised”, continues Sebastian Paris Horvitz.

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Sanofi freezes the market

Investors in the United States are also awaiting the publication of the PCE index, the Federal Reserve’s preferred gauge for measuring inflation, at 2:30 p.m.

But it is company publications that are mainly driving the market this Friday. Especially Sanofi, which plunged 16.6% after publishing results below expectations, disappointed with its profit forecast for 2024 and throwing away a margin target for 2025.

This fall shows that even the large capitalizations of the CAC 40 – Sanofi is the fifth largest stock on this parameter on the Paris Stock Exchange – are not immune to violent warning shots from investors. The one-day shortfalls recently accused by Worldline (-59%) and Alstom (-39%) have until now concerned the “smallest” values ​​of the CAC 40.

Outside of Sanofi, Vinci rose 2.9% after delivering a solid third quarter and raising its cash generation target.

Excluding the CAC 40, Rémy Cointreau lost 11.2% after seeing its sales fall more sharply than expected by analysts in the quarter from July to September, and revising downwards its objectives for the current financial year.

Conversely, Ubisoft gained 8.4% driven by good half-year results.

Air France-KLM, for its part, is experiencing strong volatility, trading in balance after falling to a historic low early in the morning. Although good in absolute terms, the group’s results were lower than expected.

On other markets, the euro is stable against the dollar at 1.0558 dollars. Oil prices are increasing, with the December contract on North Sea Brent rising 1.95% to $88.75 while that of the same maturity on WTI listed in New York is up 2.2% at 85 .01 dollars per barrel.