(Paris) Wall Street is up and European stocks closed in the green on Friday, reassured by the slowdown in inflation in the United States and in the euro zone, closing a six-month period marked by a resilient economy despite interest rate hikes. central banks.
At the close, Paris gained 1.19%, Frankfurt 1.26% and London 0.80%.
Between January 1 and June 30, Paris gained 14.31%, Frankfurt 15.98%, but London showed less progress over the semester, advancing by only 1.07%.
The British market “was penalized by the Chinese economy, which disappointed a lot, while [his] index is made up of a lot of raw materials”, a sector sensitive to the Chinese market, explains Sophie Chauvellier, manager of Dorval AM.
On Wall Street around 3:50 p.m., the Dow Jones was up 0.62%, the S
“The first half of the year was quite hectic, but at the end we arrive with an American economy which has contradicted the most pessimistic expectations and disinflation which is materializing and continues to be confirmed”, describes Sophie Chauvellier.
During Friday’s session, markets enthusiastically welcomed U.S. inflation data, which slowed in May, both year-on-year and month-on-month, according to the Commerce Department’s PCE index. , which is favored by the Federal Reserve (Fed).
US inflation thus stood at 3.8% over one year in May against 4.3% the month before.
Since March 2022, the US central bank has raised its key interest rate ten times in a row with the aim of slowing inflation and eventually bringing it back to around 2%. After marking a first break in this series of increases in June, Jerome Powell, the boss of the Fed, however, did not rule out this week that the monetary institution will carry out two further rate hikes, possibly consecutive.
“We thought that the tightening of financial conditions was going to have a stronger impact on the economy, but that was without counting on the resilience of the labor market in the United States, with a very low unemployment rate”, continues Sophie Chauvellier .
In Europe, the euro zone’s annual inflation rate continued to decline in June, falling to 5.5% from 6.1% in May, thanks to a sharp decline in energy prices, Eurostat announced on Friday. .
The unemployment rate in the euro zone remained stable in May at 6.5% of the active population, at its lowest level ever as in April, according to data published Friday by Eurostat, another sign of the resistance of the economy.
“The prospect of a recession is postponed to the beginning of 2024, disinflation and the resilience of the economy make up a positive cocktail for the equity markets”, adds Sophie Chauvellier.
Taking advantage of the enthusiasm of the NASDAQ, Apple, which is already the largest group on the stock market, once again crossed the 3 trillion mark in capitalization, a first since January 2022. The title had to exceed 190 dollars to achieve this valuation. Around 11:50 a.m. (Eastern Time), up 1.36%, it was trading at $192.16.
The other big names in technology had the wind in their sails. On Wall Street, on the processor side, Nvidia climbed 3.20% and AMD 2.14%. Tesla gained 1.80%, Meta almost 2% and Microsoft 1.50%.
In Europe, STMicroelectronics gained 2.15% and Capgemini 2.24% in Paris. In Frankfurt Infineon gained more than 3%.
Oil prices were up on Friday, but were heading for a half-year decline of around 12%.
The barrel of Brent took 0.92% around 11:55 a.m. (Eastern time) and cost 75.01 dollars and that of the American WTI gained 1.49% at 70.90 dollars.
The euro gained 0.43% to $1.0912.
Bitcoin was down 1.32% at $29,999.