European shares ended Friday at a record high, powered by a surge in miner Glencore.
On the trade front, European Union member states confirmed a majority support a free-trade agreement with South American bloc Mercosur. Global market sentiment also received a lift as investors reacted to US labour market data.
Dublin
The Irish index of shares ended the week marginally higher, with gains in food and construction stocks buoying the market.
But banking shares remained mixed, with AIB notching up a gain on Friday of just under 1 per cent, while Bank of Ireland fell back slightly as the week drew to a close.
RM Block
Among construction stocks, insulation specialist Kingspan added 2.8 per cent, while home builders Glenveagh and Cairn gained 0.9 per cent and 2.2 per cent respectively.
Ireland’s record tax take makes light of Trump tariffs fear
Elsewhere, Ryanair saw its shares shed 1.5 per cent, while ferry group ICG fell by 0.3 per cent.
London
The blue-chip FTSE 100 recorded its second straight weekly gain and its highest ever close of 10,126.6 points, marking a 0.8 per cent gain on the day.
Shares in miner Glencore jumped 9.6 per cent to their highest since July 2024 following news it is in talks with Rio Tinto about a takeover that would create the world’s largest mining group, valued at almost $207 billion (€178 billion).
London-listed shares of Rio closed 3 per cent lower.
Among other stocks, Sainsbury’s fell 5.3 per cent after Britain’s second-largest supermarket group reported a fall in general merchandise and clothing sales for the Christmas quarter.
IAG fell 2.7 per cent after the airline group named the finance chief of its British Airways unit, Jose Antonio Barrionuevo, as the group’s new chief financial officer, due to start in June.
Europe
The STOXX 600 index climbed 1 per cent on Friday, with technology stocks leading the advance and logging their best week in nearly two years.
Dutch chip equipment maker ASML added 6.8 per cent and was the biggest gainer in the tech index after HSBC raised its price target on the stock.
Germany’s Infineon rose 2.4 per cent, while STMicroelectronics added 2.9 per cent.
Tech shares also got a boost after upbeat fourth-quarter results from TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker.
Shares in Anglo American rose 2.7 per cent, a day after a filing from the European Commission showed that the miner’s deal with Canada’s Teck Resources is heading for antitrust clearance in Europe.
Defence stocks led weekly advances, with a near 10 per cent gain – their best showing since November 2020 – after US president Donald Trump called for higher defence spending.
The retail rout carried on from the previous session. Pandora warned of weaker 2025 sales growth, sending shares of the jewellery maker down 13 per cent.
New York
US equities rose on Friday to new all-time highs, with the S&P 500 Index climbing 0.5 per cent at 11.30am in New York, on pace for its second closing high of 2026. The technology-heavy Nasdaq 100 Index rallied 0.8 per cent, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.4 per cent.
In the consumer sector, Mattel slid 3.27 per cent and Nike more than 1 per cent.
Traders were also parsing job numbers. US employers added fewer jobs than expected in December, suggesting the labour market continued to soften at year-end, data released earlier in the day showed. The report supported expectations that the Federal Reserve will hold rates steady at its January meeting but left the door open for cuts later in the year.
On the corporate side, Meta Platforms agreed to a series of electricity deals to power data centres that will make it the biggest buyer of nuclear power among its hyperscaler peers. US-listed shares of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing are up after the company reported strong December sales. Qualcomm shares were down after Mizuho Securities downgraded the chipmaker to neutral from outperform. – Additional reporting: Reuters/Bloomberg
