European shares ended higher on Thursday supported by positive earnings, especially reports from Deutsche Bank and Barclays that eased concerns about the banking sector’s health, while Denmark’s SimCorp surged on a deal with Deutsche Börse.
DUBLIN
The Iseq index fell 1.1 per cent in Dublin, underperforming the marginally positive trend across the big European markets, as several of its key stocks declined.
Kerry was one the main fallers, declining 4.3 per cent to €95.68, after it said its margins were squeezed in the first quarter.
Smurfit Kappa, which releases its first-quarter earnings update on Friday, fell 2.2 per cent, with the packaging company closing at €32.02. Flutter Entertainment, the owner of Paddy Power, was another faller, declining 1.4 per cent to €179.15, after the UK government published a new gambling White Paper.
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Building materials group CRH slipped 1.25 per cent to €43.40, adding to its loss in Wednesday’s session, while Bank of Ireland dropped 1.4 per cent to €9.68 and AIB fell 1.15 per cent to €3.96.
Ryanair was one of the few climbers on the day, rising 0.7 per cent to €14.65.
LONDON
The FTSE 100 lost ground for the fourth consecutive session amid a string of earnings updates, with the blue-chip index ending 0.3 per cent lower. The mid-cap FTSE 250, however, added 0.2 per cent in the session.
Drops by the oil majors BP and Shell – despite a rebound in crude oil prices – helped to keep the index in the red, despite Barclays shares rising strongly on the back of a positive set of figures for the first quarter.
Barclays rose 5.3 per cent on an estimate-beating quarterly profit, as a resilient performance from its consumer bank offset pressure on other key business lines.
Unilever climbed 1.4 per cent on better-than-expected quarterly underlying sales, as the company behind Dove soap, Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream and Hellmann’s mayonnaise raised prices yet again to compensate for higher commodity and supply chain costs.
Sainsbury’s fell 3.45 per cent after reporting a fall in annual profits. The UK’s second-largest grocery chain reported a 5 per cent fall in underlying pretax profits for the year to March 4th.
EUROPE
The pan-European STOXX 600 index was up 0.2 per cent, gaining for the first time in three sessions.
SimCorp jumped 38.3 per cent to the top of the index, after stock exchange operator Deutsche Börse announced a €3.9 billion takeover offer of the software firm. Deutsche Börse shares fell 7.7 per cent.
Apart from deal-making, investors gauged a raft of earnings reports.
Deutsche Bank gained 2.5 per cent following a better-than-expected rise in first-quarter profit, as income from higher interest rates offset a slump in revenues at the investment bank.
The broader banking index added 1.1 per cent, while the industrial goods sector gained 1.3 per cent after Swedish engineering firm Atlas Copco jumped 14.4 per cent after posting record orders.
NEW YORK
Wall Street’s main indexes rose in early trading on Thursday as a slew of strong earnings updates from companies including Meta Platforms, Eli Lilly and Comcast outweighed data showing the US economy slowed more than anticipated in the first quarter.
Meta Platforms soared 15.2 per cent after it forecast quarterly revenue above estimate, and as chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said AI was increasing traffic to Facebook and Instagram and boosting ad sales.
Eli Lilly advanced 2.3 per cent on raising its full-year profit forecast, while Comcast rose 5.8 per cent as it beat estimates for quarterly revenue and profit, thanks to sustained demand for its broadband services and higher theme park attendance.
E-commerce company eBay climbed 3.9 per cent after it forecast current-quarter revenue above projections. Amazon and Intel, meanwhile, are among the big names set to report after the closing bell.
– Additional reporting: Reuters
