CAC40: Anecdotal gain, Sanofi in support

(CercleFinance.com) - The Paris Bourse ended the session with an anecdotal gain of 0.
12% at 7365 points, buoyed by Sanofi (+3.3%), Hermès (+1.5%) and L'Oréal (1%), as investors digested a salvo of statistics whose publications punctuated the session.

Across the Atlantic, however, it was the red that dominated, with -0.4% for the Nasdaq and S&P500 and -0.6% for the Dow Jones.

The US stock market failed to welcome the long-awaited publication of US retail sales. These rose by 0.7% between October and November (after +0.5% the previous month).

On the other hand, US industrial production posted a 0.1% decline between October and November (after -0.5% the previous month).

In detail, the Fed, which publishes these figures, reports that in November, manufacturing production rose by 0.2% sequentially (i.e. compared with the previous month), supported by a 3.5% rise in the motor vehicles and parts index.

For their part, the mining and utilities indices fell by 0.9% and 1.3% respectively.

Also according to the Federal Reserve, the capacity utilization rate in US industry deteriorated by 0.3 points to 76.8% in November, a level 2.9 percentage points below its long-term average (1972-2023).

The meeting of the Fed's Monetary Policy Committee begins today, and will end tomorrow with a press conference by Chairman Jerome Powell.

A quarter-point easing is almost fully on the table, and investors will be following the Fed Chairman's comments on the pace of further cuts.

It should be noted that on the Old Continent, investor and analyst sentiment in Germany has improved much more strongly than expected, according to a survey by the ZEW economic research institute.

Its index rose to 15.7 this month, compared with 7.4 in November, when economists were expecting a score of 8.
The sub-index of investors' judgment of the current situation, meanwhile, showed little change, falling by 1.7 points to -93.1.
On the bond front, Bunds eased (-3pts) to 2.215% (despite the vote of no-confidence in Chancellor Scholz), and OATs shed 2pts to 3.022% (i.e. an OAT/Bunds spread > 80pts). Meanwhile, US 10-year T-Bond yields are up (+1.5pt) to 4.41%.

On the forex front, the euro is stable against the greenback at around $1.05/E.

Lastly, Brent crude oil is down 1.5% in London, at around $72.8 a barrel.

In French company news, Alstom announced that it had signed a new four-year maintenance contract with Metro de Panamá.

Alstom also added that it had completed a £25 million modernization of the fleet of Class 458 electric multiple units (EMUs) for the South Western Railway (SWR).
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Bouygues Construction announced on Tuesday that it had been selected to build the tunnels for a major portion of the Melbourne (Australia) metro project.

Finally, Sanofi and Teva Pharmaceuticals announce that the RELIEVE UCCD phase IIb study has met its primary endpoints in patients suffering from ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease.

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