The Paris Bourse gained nearly 0.6% this morning, around 7355 points, driven in particular by Worldline (+2.5%) and Alstom (+2%).

For this first session of December, investors are clearly keen to continue the positive momentum now well established on the markets.

The trend is still benefiting from the spectacular moderation in inflation, which daily reinforces hopes of further rate cuts by the major central banks.

While the CAC index has just completed its best month of the year, many analysts point out that the worst-case scenario has now been ruled out, suggesting a new uptrend for equity markets.

December is traditionally a buoyant month for stock markets, with year-end balance sheet adjustments seeing managers sell underperforming stocks in favor of winning ones to make their portfolios more attractive.

Christopher Dembik, Investment Strategy Advisor at Pictet AM, warns: "However, we will have to keep a close eye on Christine Lagarde's speech at 2:00 p.m., which could dampen investors' spirits.

"Indeed, the central bank is more cautious about expectations of rate cuts than the market is," reminds the strategist.

The ECB President will be speaking midday at a forum on European banking supervision to be held in Frankfurt.

In the meantime, this morning investors took note of the PMI HCOB index for manufacturing industry in the eurozone, produced by S&P Global. This recovered from 43.1 in October to 44.2 in November, its highest level since last May, but still points to a sharp contraction in the sector.

The data once again highlight declines in activity, new orders, purchasing volumes and inventories, but the outlook for activity has improved. At the same time, purchase prices fell sharply again.

On the bond market, 10-year T-Bonds fell to 4.31%, the German Bund of the same maturity was stable at 2.44% and the French OAT moved to 2.98%.

On the currency front, the euro remained stable against the dollar, still trading at around $1.09/euro.

On the energy market, Brent crude failed to benefit from yesterday's announcement of an OPEC+ production cut, falling by 2.8% to $80.5/barrel.

In other French company news, Pierre & Vacances reported net income of -20.6 million euros for fiscal 2023, compared with +325 million the previous year, but adjusted EBITDA of 137.1 million, up 74% on fiscal 2019 (pre-Covid reference).

TotalEnergies announced on Friday that it had signed an agreement with the British group Prax to sell its minority stake in a refinery in South Africa.

Thales reports that it has signed an agreement to insure its entire pension scheme in the UK, a decision that will result in the recognition of a financial expense.

Finally, noting the opening of insolvency proceedings in respect of several entities of the Signa group, Peugeot Invest reports that its exposure to this group represents 2.9% of revalued gross assets, which stood at 6.4 billion euros at the end of June.

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