European stocks rose on Friday on a surge in technology stocks, strong earnings from France’s L’Oreal SA and a broad boost to sentiment provided by a surprise interest payment from debt-ridden China Evergrande Group (恆大集團).
The STOXX 600 added 0.5 percent to close at over six-week highs and logged its third consecutive week of gains, up 0.5 percent.
News that the Chinese property developer had made a bond payment to avert a default lifted the mood globally. Worries about contagion from a potential default have rattled markets recently.
France’s blue-chip CAC 40 rose 0.7 percent and outperformed its European peers, riding on a 5.1 percent surge in L’Oreal shares following the cosmetics company’s strong results.
Shares in Dutch semiconductor equipment maker ASML Holding NV and German software firm SAP SE rose 3.2 percent and 1.2 percent respectively, after stumbling earlier this week following their results. The tech sector rose 1.5 percent.
Investors appeared to look past a survey that showed growth in eurozone business activity slowed this month as firms face soaring costs due to supply chain constraints, while the bloc’s dominant service industry struggled amid COVID-19 concerns.
Automaker Renault SA and Continental AG flagged chip shortages hitting output and margins.
“We’ve lots of earnings beats on lowered expectations, and then you’re getting comments from CEOs suggesting supply chains are damaged — but certain firms have said that they’re on top of it,” said Keith Temperton, sales trader at Forte Securities. “That’s hopeful for the markets.”
A bunch of upbeat earnings lifted Wall Street’s S&P 500 to a record high, while its European counterpart is less than 1 percent shy of its August peak.
Europe Inc is expected to see a 47.6 percent rise in third-quarter profit to 96.1 billion euros (US$112 billion), latest data from Refinitiv IBES showed, a slight improvement from last week’s 46.7 percent growth forecast.
Eurozone inflation expectations hit their highest levels in years, putting additional pressure on the European Central Bank over its insistence on maintaining crisis-era stimulus. The central bank is set to meet next week.
“That inflation is transitory does not necessarily mean that it is short-lived. An adjustment of supply to the changes in patterns of demand caused by the pandemic may be slow, and keep upward pressure on prices for longer,” strategists at Citigroup Inc wrote in a note.
Swedish mining firm Boliden AB dipped 6.8 percent as its third-quarter operating profit fell below market forecasts.
Remy Cointreau rose 1.8 percent after it said it was growing increasingly confident about its full year outlook after second-quarter sales beat expectations.
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
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six