Euronews Business looks at which European stocks made impressive moves this week and which were lagging behind.
ADVERTISEMENTEuropean shares were buoyant on Friday morning, boosted by luxury and financial stocks, as the German inflation print released on Friday came down to an almost a two-and-a-half-year low.
This has led to renewed expectations of the European Central Bank having reached a peak in its monetary policy tightening and potentially starting to cut rates sooner than expected.
However, energy and mining stocks turned lower this week, mostly due to lacklustre Chinese demand.
Gold, which recently started to make an impressive comeback at the end of November, by moving closer to its all-time high of $2,060 (€1,910) per troy ounce, stabilised somewhat this week, by posting a fall of 2%.
However, on Friday morning, it was still trading above the $2,000 level, at about 2,029 per troy ounce, with a monthly gain of 3.64%.
Brent crude oil also fell 4.56% this week, the seventh weekly loss, pressurised by oversupply and fears of Chinese demand not recovering as expected. Speculations of OPEC+’s latest supply cuts not being able to boost oil prices have also been rife lately.
The CAC 40 index saw a 1.98% rise this week, to €7,481.4, whereas the STOXX 600 index rose 1.81% to €470.2. The FTSE 100 index inched up 1.05% to €7,532.0 on Friday afternoon.
CAC 40 top weekly gainers
French bank BNP Paribas gained 6,59% after the bank secured a deal to provide custody and settlement services to Goldman Sachs in Austria.
Luxury goods company Kering jumped 5.46% as the company announced an interim dividend for the financial year 2023 and revamped its sourcing standards according to better sustainability guidelines.
Fellow luxury goods giant LVMH soared 4.81% after the company spent almost €1 billion on a luxury block on the Champs-Élysées in Paris.
Real estate giant Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield inched up 4.70%, following the company's announcement of the new west London offices for its Vue Cinemas.
Payments services Worldline climbed up 4.50%, as the company still basks in Credit Agricole’s support, following the latter recently announcing that it is contemplating acquiring a larger stake in Worldline.
CAC 40 top weekly losers
Telemarketing and debt services company Teleperformance plunged 7.23% this week, despite the company being one of the top winners of the European Customer Contact Industry Awards.
Network provider Orange slid 2.39% after it considered a shift to new radio technology and took one step closer to becoming a platform company.
French energy giant TotalEnergies sunk 1.67% following a recent safety incident that shut down its Shetland Gas Plant, with the company still unsure of when operations are likely to resume.
Electrical systems company Thales inched lower 1.62% as the company finalises its acquisition of Imperva, a cybersecurity company.
Pharmaceutical giant Sanofi fell 0.51%, as CEO Paul Hudson recently admitted that the company’s research and development plan could be clearer and better explained.
