(News Bulletin 247) – The Paris Stock Exchange ended up 0.7% on Wednesday evening, back on 7,000 points. Brent is back below $80, undermined by fears about global demand.

The Paris Stock Exchange puts an end to a series of three sessions of decline, and records its rebound which began at the end of the morning. Hesitant at the start of the session, the CAC 40 posted an increase of 0.69% at the close, which allowed it to return to 7,000 points at 7,034.16 points on Wednesday.

On Wall Street, two series not seen since November 2021 are at stake. “We are in the seventh positive session in a row for the S&P 500 and the eighth for the Nasdaq but this momentum is limited because there are not that many participants who benefit from it”, underlined Patrick O’Hare of Briefing.com reported by AFP.

Note a significant movement in oil prices which lost more than 2% due to fears about global demand and primarily that from China. Brent has just returned below $80, for the first time since July. A barrel of Brent from the North Sea, for delivery in January, plunged 2.25% to 79.77 dollars, the lowest since July. Its American equivalent, a barrel of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for delivery in December, dropped 2.35% to $75.55, also the lowest since July.

The rate debate

Investors are also in a waiting position before the long-awaited speech by Jerome Powell, the chairman of the American Federal Reserve, on Thursday during a debate at the International Monetary Fund. Before that, he will speak at an economic conference in Washington this Wednesday.

But several Fed officials and in particular supporters of a strict monetary policy came to instil doubt. Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari said it was premature to declare victory too quickly in the Fed’s battle against inflation. He was followed by another Fed official, Michelle Bowman, who judged that a further rate hike could be necessary to control inflation, if it did not slow down in the coming months.

Quoted by AFP, the governor of the Bank of England (BoE) recalled on Wednesday that it was “far too early to consider interest rate cuts”, during the 2023 “Financial System Conference” in Dublin .

The governor of the central bank of Latvia, Martins Kazaks, indicated for his part that the European Central Bank should not rule out further rate increases. “We cannot rule out the possibility that further rate hikes are necessary because we simply don’t know,” he told a conference in Riga.

Crédit Agricole exceeds expectations, Legrand disappoints

Publications from companies listed on the CAC 40 are continuing their course. Crédit Agricole closes up 1.1% after quarterly accounts better than expectations.

On the other hand, Legrand disappointed the market (-1.3%), with lower quarterly growth due to a sharply declining building market.

On the foreign exchange market, the euro rose 0.2% to 1.0717 dollars.