A surge for London-listed companies brought European stock markets within striking distance of an all-time high on Friday as investors cheered the likelihood of an orderly Brexit after a landslide election victory for British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
The UK-focused FTSE mid-cap index jumped 5 percent to a record high, pushing the broader pan-European STOXX 600 up 1.1 percent to 412 points, up 1.1 percent for the week.
The blue-chip FTSE 100 also advanced on Friday as solid gains in banks and utilities helped the export-heavy index shrug off the impact of a surge in sterling, which typically weakens sentiment toward component companies.
Dublin’s ISEQ, also considered a barometer of Brexit sentiment, jumped to a 12-year high.
Markets believe a Conservative Party win would enable Johnson to deliver Brexit within weeks, easing fears that the UK could crash out and ending three-and-a-half years of uncertainty over the shape of the country’s exit from the trading bloc.
“The big issue has been the lack of direction and that goes away, which is why sterling is rallying and Gilt yields are back up and domestically focused equities are gaining,” said Gaurav Saroliya, director of global macro strategy at Oxford Economics.
The benchmark European index is just two points shy of a record high hit in 2015.
It is also on track to end the year almost 20 percent higher, its biggest annual gain in a decade, as investors turn optimistic about another major economic issue — the prolonged US-China trade dispute.
Trade-sensitive German shares jumped 1.3 percent on Friday after the US agreed to suspend a new round of Chinese tariffs in return for Beijing buying more US farm goods.
All major country indices were trading higher.
The European travel and leisure index rose, boosted by a 7.5 to 9 percent surge for Brexit-sensitive airline stocks such as EasyJet PLC, International Consolidated Airlines Group and Ryanair Holdings PLC.
Delivery Hero SE gained more than 23 percent as it agreed to buy South Korea’s top food delivery app operator Woowa Brothers for US$4 billion and form a joint venture.
German consumer goods company Henkel AG & Co slipped 3.67 percent as the consumer goods company said it expects its earnings before interest and taxes margin to fall to 15 percent next year.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last