FX.co ★ European stocks soar to highs on strong quarterly reports from local companies

On Tuesday, the key European stock indices rose dramatically amid positive quarterly reports from energy companies in the eurozone.

At the time of writing, the composite indicator of Europe's leading companies STOXX Europe 600 soared by 1.3% to 417.4%, its all-time high in the last six weeks.

The French CAC 40 gained 1.61%, the German DAX added 1.1%, and the British FTSE 100 jumped by 1.5%, its highest level in more than five weeks.

Top gainers and losers

The stocks of British online supermarket Ocado Group jumped by 22%. The day before, the company said that Ocado Group had entered the South Korean market due to a partnership agreement with local Lotte Shopping.

At the start of the trading session, the stocks of oil giant BP soared to the February 2020 highs. However, later they declined slightly and at the time of writing they rose by 0.6%. In July-September, the company's profits increased by 2.5 times to $8.15 billion in annual terms.

The market capitalization of Eni, TotalEnergies and Shell rose by 1.64%, 2.09%, and 1.25% respectively.

The stocks of British IT giant Osirium Technologies surged by 30%. In the third quarter of fiscal 2022, the company increased its customer base and revenue significantly.

The stocks of the owner of Internet assets Naspers Ltd. advanced by 7%.

Quotes of British automaker Aston Martin Lagonda Global jumped 3%.

The market capitalization of IWG, a Swiss company that provides office rental services, fell by 1.7%. At the same time, the company increased its revenue by 34% in the third quarter.

The stocks of Swiss bank Credit Suisse rose by 2.3%.

Market sentiment

In addition to quarterly reports from top European companies, on Tuesday investors discussed the upcoming decisions of the US and UK central banks, which will be announced on Wednesday and Thursday respectively. According to experts' preliminary forecasts, both regulators will raise interest rates by 75 basis points. At the same time, market participants hope that the Bank of England and the US Federal Reserve will signal a slowdown in monetary policy tightening in the future.

Meanwhile, at the end of October housing prices in the UK fell for the first time since July 2021 and recorded a decline of 0.9%.

In September, Import prices in Germany soared by 29.8% year-on-year. The final figure was much better than market expectations. However, it is still slightly down from the 32.7% increase in August.

Previous trading results

On Monday, European stock indices closed mostly in the green zone. By the end of trading, the composite indicator of Europe's leading companies STOXX Europe 600 grew by 0.35% to 412.2 points.

The French CAC 40 sank by 0.1%, the German DAX gained 0.08%, and the British FTSE 100 rose by 0.66%.

The shares of Swiss national bank SNB jumped by 2.9%. At the same time, the day before SNB reported a significant loss in January-September 2022 amid the franc's strengthening and rising interest rates.

The stocks of Swiss bank Credit Suisse Group AG surged by 5.2% on disclosure of details of its plan to float shares worth 1.76 billion Swiss francs.

The market capitalization of Italian UniCredit SpA increased by 2.4% due to an improvement in its net interest income forecast for 2022.

The stocks of German power generating company Verbund AG plummeted by 4.5%.

The shares of French drug maker Orpea S.A. soared by 24%.

The quotes of Swiss commodities supplier Glencore sank by 1.7%. The day before, the international business daily Financial Times reported that Tesla had begun talks with the company about possibly buying a stake in the electric carmaker.

On Monday, European investors analyzed fresh data on the eurozone. According to a preliminary estimate by experts from the Statistical Office of the European Union (Eurostat), annual inflation in 19 EU countries unexpectedly accelerated to a record 10.7% in October from 9.9% in September. At the same time, analysts predicted the rise of the index only to 10.2%.

In the third quarter, the GDP growth of 19 EU countries slowed to 2.1% in annual terms and to 0.2% in quarterly terms. Final indicators coincided with preliminary expectations of experts.

According to data from the Federal Statistical Office of Germany (Destatis), at the end of September the level of retail sales in the country grew by 0.9% against August. Analysts forecasted a 0.3% decrease.

In July-September, the GDP in Italy increased by 0.5% in quarterly terms. At the same time, the country's economic growth declined compared to the second quarter of 2022 when the rise was 1.1%. Despite this fact, the final figure exceeded the forecasts of experts who did not expect the change in GDP.