Europe close: Chinese move suggests global easing

Date: Thursday 07 Jun 2012

- Chinese central bank lowers interest rates
- Rumours of co-ordinated, global monetary easing
- Successful Spanish bond auction

FTSE-100: +1.18%
Dax-30: +0.82%
Stoxx 600: +0.98%
Cac-40: +0.42%
Ibex 35: +0.3%
FTSE MIB: +0.88%

The suspicion the major world economies are to undertake a coordinated programme of monetary easing pushed all major European markets up through Thursday.

The People’s Bank of China reduced its one-year deposit rate to 3.25% from 3.5% and the one year lending rate from 6.56% to 6.31%, in what many expect will be a programme of interest rate cuts, and/or quantitative easing, amongst the world’s biggest economies.

Spain managed to sell benchmark 10-year bonds at an interest rate of 6.044% today, the auction was 3.29 times oversubscribed, a figure most observers would consider healthy.

COMPANIES

The strongest sector on the Stoxx Europe 600 index was basic resources (+2.52%), driven up by an increase in the price of industrial metals. Utilities were the weakest stocks, down 0.74%.

The Spanish debt auction lifted several Spanish banks, including Santander and BBVA.

Vivendi was the biggest riser in Paris after reports suggested the board are considering a sale of its stake in Activision Blizzard.

In Germany, Commerzbank led the way, up 5.6%.

OTHER MARKETS

By 17:12 in London the euro was down 0.1% against the dollar at $1.2568.

Futures contracts for front month delivery of Brent crude had dropped 0.38% by 16:55 to $100.26 per barrel.

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