European shares on Friday closed higher, extending gains after impressive US jobs data bolstered sentiment buoyed by positive statements from Washington regarding trade talks with China.
The pan-European STOXX 600 on Friday finished up 4.70 points, or 1.2 percent, at 407.36, helping erase nearly all of a tumultuous week’s losses from a close of 407.43 on Nov. 29.
Stocks swung wildly this week on conflicting statements and reports regarding the progress of US-China trade negotiations, as well as some weak economic indicators from Europe.
Data on Friday showed that US job growth last month increased by the most in 10 months, confirming that the US economy remained on a moderate expansion path. That helped quell some fears of a negative rub-off on growth from a trade war with China.
“The market has been looking at the data with rapt attention, and of course we had what could be called a blowout number,” City Index market analyst Ken Odeluga said. “The possibility of the beginnings of some sort of slowdown tends to be obliviated by a reading like that, and the details tend to support it as well.”
This added to optimism that stemmed from comments by US President Donald Trump on Friday that discussions with China were “moving right along,” which was later echoed by US National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow.
From their end, Chinese officials said that they would waive import tariffs for some soybeans and pork shipments from the US.
Gains on the day in Europe were broad-based and led by commodity-linked stocks.
Retail shares were also in the top mix, with Marks & Spencer Group PLC rising 4.1 percent after JPMorgan Chase & Co upgraded the stock from “underweight” to “neutral.”
London’s FTSE 100 on Friday gained 101.81 points, or 1.4 percent, to 7,239.66, its best day in more than four months as sterling weakened and energy firms rode oil prices higher.
However, on the week the FTSE posted its worst loss in two months, falling 1.5 percent from 7,346.53 on Nov. 29.
Investors are bracing for an action-packed week as Britons go to vote on Thursday, with opinion polls suggesting that the ruling Conservative Party would win an outright majority needed for Britain’s smooth exit from the EU.
Limiting gains on the Frankfurt index were figures showing that Germany’s industrial output unexpectedly dropped in October, reviving worries over the growth outlook of Europe’s economic powerhouse.
The DAX on Friday rose 111.78 points, or 0.9 percent, to 13,166.58, a drop of 0.5 percent from 13,236.38 a week earlier.
Additional reporting by staff writer
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
Nvidia Corp’s demand for advanced packaging from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) remains strong though the kind of technology it needs is changing, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday, after he was asked whether the company was cutting orders. Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Blackwell, consists of multiple chips glued together using a complex chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) advanced packaging technology offered by TSMC, Nvidia’s main contract chipmaker. “As we move into Blackwell, we will use largely CoWoS-L. Of course, we’re still manufacturing Hopper, and Hopper will use CowoS-S. We will also transition the CoWoS-S capacity to CoWos-L,” Huang said
VERTICAL INTEGRATION: The US fabless company’s acquisition of the data center manufacturer would not affect market competition, the Fair Trade Commission said The Fair Trade Commission has approved Advanced Micro Devices Inc’s (AMD) bid to fully acquire ZT International Group Inc for US$4.9 billion, saying it would not hamper market competition. As AMD is a fabless company that designs central processing units (CPUs) used in consumer electronics and servers, while ZT is a data center manufacturer, the vertical integration would not affect market competition, the commission said in a statement yesterday. ZT counts hyperscalers such as Microsoft Corp, Amazon.com Inc and Google among its major clients and plays a minor role in deciding the specifications of data centers, given the strong bargaining power of
TARIFF SURGE: The strong performance could be attributed to the growing artificial intelligence device market and mass orders ahead of potential US tariffs, analysts said The combined revenue of companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange and the Taipei Exchange for the whole of last year totaled NT$44.66 trillion (US$1.35 trillion), up 12.8 percent year-on-year and hit a record high, data compiled by investment consulting firm CMoney showed on Saturday. The result came after listed firms reported a 23.92 percent annual increase in combined revenue for last month at NT$4.1 trillion, the second-highest for the month of December on record, and posted a 15.63 percent rise in combined revenue for the December quarter at NT$12.25 billion, the highest quarterly figure ever, the data showed. Analysts attributed the
RSS