European stocks rose to their highest level in almost seven years amid speculation that the European Central Bank (ECB) will consider quantitative easing at its meeting next month, and as German factory orders and US payrolls beat forecasts.
The STOXX Europe 600 Index climbed 1.8 percent to 350.97 at the close of trading on Friday, as Germany’s DAX hit a record high.
The benchmark European gauge, which posted its fourth weekly advance, slid after ECB President Mario Draghi refrained from pledging stimulus for the eurozone at a meeting of the bank’s Governing Council. Draghi said the monetary authority will reassess the situation early next year.
The council expects to consider a proposal for broad-based asset purchases including sovereign debt at the next monetary policy meeting on Jan. 22, according to two eurozone central bank officials familiar with the deliberations.
“European markets are liquidity addicts at the moment,” Otto Waser, chief investment officer at R&A Research & Asset Management AG in Zurich, said by telephone. “You get rallies whenever somebody eases in the world.”
Germany factory orders, adjusted for seasonal swings and inflation, climbed 2.5 percent after a revised increase of 1.1 percent in September, data from the German Ministry of Economy showed on Friday. Economists had predicted a 0.5 percent increase.
Employers in the US added 321,000 jobs last month, beating forecasts for the biggest gain since January 2012, figures from the US Department of Labor showed on Friday. The jobless rate held at a six-year low of 5.8 percent.
“It’s a boom economy,” Mirabaud Securities LLP vice president John Plassard said. “Where is the crisis? The private sector is really strong. There is a seasonality factor, but those figures are incredible. The US economy is really on its way.”
National benchmark indices gained in 16 of the 18 western European markets, with Greece’s ASE Index rising 4.1 percent for the best performance. Germany’s DAX added 2.4 percent, while the UK’s FTSE 100 rose 1 percent.
Gauges of automakers, banks and telecommunications companies were among the biggest advancers of the 19 industry groups in the STOXX 600.
Daimler AG rose 3.6 percent, Volkswagen AG increased 3 percent and Peugeot SA added 3.2 percent.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day