by Claude Chendjou

PARIS (Reuters) – The main European stock markets, except Frankfurt, ended a session in the red on Thursday, and on Wall Street the trend was also uncertain after the publication of many contrasting indicators, ahead of the official monthly report on American employment scheduled for Friday.

In Paris, the CAC 40 ended down 0.92% at 7,431.96 points, after briefly reducing some of its losses during the session following the announcement of the appointment of Michel Barnier as Prime Minister of France.

The Paris index was mainly affected by the fall in shares of European luxury champions, with traders citing growing concerns over slowing demand in China, a key market for the sector, after the world’s second-largest economy showed fresh signs of running out of steam.

The British Footsie fell by 0.34%, while the German Dax, supported by defensive sectors such as real estate and utilities, gained 0.02%.

The EuroStoxx 50 index lost 0.68% and the FTSEurofirst 300 0.51%. The Stoxx 600 had a fourth session in the red, losing 0.54% with sectors sensitive to the economic situation such as luxury (-3.03%), consumption (-1.37%) and industry (-0.82%).

At the time of the European closing, the Dow Jones fell by 0.80%, the Standard & Poor’s 500 by 0.58% and the Nasdaq by 0.11%, while these last two indices were in the green for a time, supported in particular by activity in the services sector in the United States.

The country’s ISM services index came in at 51.5 in August from 51.4 in July, compared with a consensus of 51.1, suggesting that the economy is continuing to grow, albeit at a moderate pace compared to last year, which has partly eased fears of a recession.

Additionally, ahead of the U.S. Department of Labor’s monthly report on job creation, wages and unemployment, which will be released Friday, weekly jobless claims in the United States fell last week to 227,000.

In contrast, the ADP survey showed that the private sector in the United States created fewer jobs than expected in August, at 99,000, the lowest figure in three and a half years.

These contrasting data complicate expectations of rate cuts as the US Federal Reserve (Fed) meets on September 17 and 18.

In the eurozone, where the European Central Bank (ECB) is due to make its next monetary policy decision on September 12, today’s data such as retail sales or the Ifo economic forecasts in Germany also do not provide a more precise idea of ​​the economic situation in the bloc.

VALUES IN EUROPE

The major French banks Societe Generale (+2.42%), Crédit Agricole (+1.24%) and BNP Paribas (+2.72%) were buoyed by the announcement of the appointment of Michel Barnier as the new head of government.

Biomérieux jumped 4.17% after raising its annual forecasts.

Edenred (+1.70%) and Lanxess (+3.08%) benefited from recommendation upgrades from Morgan Stanley.

Associated British Foods fell 8.47% as the group said it expected Primark’s like-for-like sales to fall in the second half.

ASML Holdings fell 2.23%, again penalized by the fall in semiconductor values ​​in the wake of Nvidia which lost more than 11% over the last two sessions.

CHANGES

The dollar fell to a one-month low against the yen on Thursday and is under pressure against other major currencies on concerns about the U.S. economic outlook.

The dollar index fell 0.15% against a basket of benchmark currencies, while the euro advanced 0.17% to $1.1101.

The yen is trading at 143.47 per dollar, up 0.18%.

RATE

The yield on 10-year US Treasury bonds fell 1.8 basis points to 3.7495%, after a 6.6-point decline the previous day.

The ten-year German Bund ended virtually unchanged at 2.228%, while the two-year Bund lost 1.9 points to 2.295%.

OIL

The oil market is benefiting from the prospect of a postponement of the increase in OPEC+ production, initially planned for the beginning of October: Brent is up 0.66% to $73.17 per barrel and American light crude (West Texas Intermediate, WTI) is up 0.59% to $69.61.

(Written by Claude Chendjou, edited by Zhifan Liu)

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