Inflation in the euro area, ECB president Lagarde’s worried speech and contradictory signals from Ukraine the stock exchanges of the Old Continent are holding back, with Milan losing 1.2% at the halfway point and, at the moment, the worst of the day. Among the other European lists, in an uncertain climate, Frankfurt and Madrid lost 0.8%, Paris 0.4% and Amsterdam reduced by 0.2%. London remains in a very slight countertrend and rises by 0.3% after the expected rate hike by the Bank of England.
The BTP-Bund spread is confirmed at around 153 basis points, with gas growing by around 7% at a price of 110 euros per megawatt hour. Oil has accelerated since the start, rising by 5% to reach 100 dollars a barrel. The futures on the start of Wall Street are uncertain. On the main list of the Milan Stock Exchange, strong sales on banks (Banco Bpm and Unicredit -5%, Intesa -4%) while Diasorin grows by 6% after the accounts
Russian aggression of Ukraine “takes the European economy into unknown territory” and “revealed our collective vulnerability that comes from economic dependence on hostile actors”. ECB president Christine said so Lagarde at the conference ‘The Ecb and its Watchers’. “The ECB is next to the people of Ukraine, who have suffered a horrible act of aggression,” she added. The war in Ukraine has set in motion new inflation factors, and the euro area is unlikely to return to the low levels of inflation seen before the pandemic. On the contrary, medium-term inflation is “increasingly likely” to stabilize at the 2% target. Lagarde explained. The war in Ukraine “poses significant risks to the growth” of the Eurozone, and could “set in motion new inflationary trends”, you further said, explaining that the conflict “has cast a shadow” on Europe. The ECB is ready to backtrack on its monetary stimulus reduction plans, if necessary in the face of the risks posed by the war, the ECB remains ready to implement new tools, if needed.
Great seat for i Asian and Pacific equity marketsor, with traders who looked at the strength of the European stock exchanges and Wall Street on the eve, also on the hopes of a solution to the conflict in Ukraine. Also appreciated was the ‘solidity’ of the Fed, which confirmed its monetary policy program even in a context of war. So Tokyo closed up 3.4%, the Hong Kong Stock Exchange continues the rally and closes the session still in a sprint: the Hang Seng index ends with another jump of 7.04%, to 21,501.23 points. The euphoria is still linked to the indications that emerged yesterday in Beijing by the Committee for Financial Stability and Development, chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Liu He: the government has committed itself to promoting policies to stimulate markets and to increase economic growth against fears of investors on the risks of the real estate sector, delisting abroad and the squeeze on Internet companies.
Chinese lists are more cautious: Shanghai grows by 1.3% and Shenzhen by 2.1%. In the same vein, the Seoul Stock Exchange, which concluded with the general index up by 1.3% and the ‘technological’ Kosdaq up by 2.5%. The closing of the Sydney stock exchange rose by one percentage point, where various stocks that can anticipate the performance of their sectors in Europe are listed. The futures on the start-up of the Old Continent stock markets around parity.
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