Investing.com - European stock indices increased on Wednesday due to strong economic data from France, until investors analyze a number of corporate releases.
At 04:00 in Eastern time (09:00 GRINVICH) The DAX index in Germany was traded by 0.3% higher, CAC 40 in France rose by 0.5%, and the FTSE index fell 0.1%; At the same time, the shares of mining companies suffered from the further decline in prices for non-ferrous metals after the announcement of China's new pollution policy.
Industrial production in France in January increased by 3.3% compared with the previous month, which is a significant jump against the background of falling in December by 0.7%. It will be a "balsam for the soul" of members of the European Central Bank on the eve of the monetary policy meeting on Thursday, especially after on Tuesday, the Eurozone quarterly GDP was revised in the direction of a decrease in the fourth quarter under the influence of quarantine.
Although there is hope that these limitations will soon be removed in the region, in all likelihood, a technical recession will be observed when data on GDP for the first quarter will be published. This can force the ECB to increase the volume of bond shopping, not least in order to prevent the effects of global increase in long-term interest rates.
Oil prices on Wednesday practically did not change until traders wait for official data on the reserves of crude oil in the United States from the Energy Information Management (EIA), which are expected to be late on Wednesday. According to the American Oil Institute (API), oil reserves for the week ended on March 5, increased by 12.8 million barrels.
Futures for American wet oil WTI are traded by 0.1% higher, $ 64.09 per barrel, while the International Reference Brent Oil Contract remained unchanged at $ 67.52.
Gold futures fell 0.3% to $ 1711.30 per ounce, while EUR / USD has not changed and traded at 1.1898.
Author Peter Nerst
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