European stocks rose rallied Wednesday from losses recorded in the previous session, buoyed by mining and technology, even as investors continued to weigh the economic impact of the Iran war.
The advance was helped as brent crude oil fell 1 per cent to $106.18 (€90.67) a barrel.
Dublin
The Iseq All-Share index rose 0.4 per cent to 12,531.64.
PTSB’s shares edged 0.3 per cent higher to €2.92. The High Court gave it permission to go ahead with a general meeting (egm) on Austrian group Bawag’s €2.97 a share bid.
RM Block
Some minority shareholders had asked the court to decide before the meeting on whether the deal needs to be ratified by two groups of shareholders – one excluding the Government, which owns 57.5 per cent of PTSB and is backing the deal.
AIB and Bank of Ireland each rose 1 per cent, to €9.66 and €16.68, respectively.
Home builders were also in demand, with Cairn Homes adding 1.8 per cent to €2.31, while Glenveagh Properties advanced 1.1 per cent to €2.26.
London
UK stocks ended higher – with the FTSE 100 index adding 0.6 per cent.
Intertek was one of the top gainers on the index, closing 5.28 per cent higher after the product testing company said it was ready to recommend a £9.4 billion (€10.9 billion) takeover proposal by Swedish private equity group EQT.
The gains helped reassure investors unsettled by the Middle East impasse, rising oil prices and fresh uncertainty over UK prime minister Keir Starmer’s future.
UK health minister Wes Streeting is preparing to resign and could quit as early as Thursday, adding that he is likely to mount a formal challenge for the party leadership.
“The prime minister may be ‘forced’ to step down if enough ministers resign. His defenestration seems to be a matter of when rather than if,” said Robert Wood, chief UK economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics.
Investors were also worried that a potential successor to Starmer might advocate for increased spending, despite the UK’s already strained finances.
Europe
The basic resources index jumped 4.4 per cent to a record high, tracking higher base metal prices and leading sectoral advances. It is Europe’s best-performing sector this year.
European semiconductor stocks Infineon Technologies, STMicroelectronics and Aixtron each gained about 10 per cent.
Financials and healthcare shares rose. Merck jumped 7.2 per cent after the German firm lifted its forecast range for full-year adjusted operating profit. Wegovy maker Novo Nordisk closed 0.9 per cent higher.
Allianz rose 1.1 per cent after the insurance company posted a 52 per cent rise in first-quarter net profit. ABN Amro advanced on beating quarterly profit estimates and was on track for its best day since February last year.
New York
The S&P 500 hovered near record highs in early afternoon trading as chip stocks and megacap tech shares rose, even though hot producer prices data reinforced bets that the Federal Reserve would keep monetary policy restrictive.
Alphabet and Tesla climbed. The Philadelphia SE Semiconductor index was testing a new record high, bouncing back from a sell-off in the previous session.
Of Irish interest, CRH dipped after the Dublin-based building materials and services giant said that its chief financial officer of one year, Nancy Buese, was stepping down. She has been replaced by an in internal figure, Aylwyn Bryan.
Traders now expect the Fed to stay on hold all through the year and a 34.3 per cent chance of a rate hike by December, compared with an around 15 per cent chance seen a week ago, according to the CME FedWatch Tool.
Markets are expecting a potentially more hawkish central bank under Kevin Warsh, whom the Senate confirmed to the board on Tuesday and could move to approve as chair as soon as Wednesday. Jerome Powell’s term ends on Friday.
Meanwhile, US president Donald Trump landed in Beijing accompanied by an entourage that included Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Elon Musk, after pledging to urge China’s Xi Jinping to “open up” to US business at the start of their two-day summit.
Among other movers, Nebius Group jumped after the AI cloud firm reported a nearly eightfold rise in quarterly revenue. – Additional reporting, Reuters
