The Paris Bourse is up sharply this morning, gaining almost 2% around 7,610 points, driven by the euphoria sweeping through the luxury goods sector, with LVMH up 11%, Kering up 4.4% and Hermès up 4%.

Last night, Bernard Arnault's group reported sales of 86.2 billion euros for 2023, with organic growth of 13% compared to 2022 (+9% on a reported basis). LVMH's net income, Group share, amounted to 15.2 billion euros, up 8%, results which propelled the share this morning.

Following yesterday's unsurprising meeting of the ECB, which maintained its status quo on rates, investors will hear the Fed's preferred inflation indicator, the PCE price index, early this afternoon, which will enable markets to fine-tune their rate expectations.

According to consensus, inflation in the consumer deflator sense should have risen by just 0.2% month-on-month in December.

If this were the case, it would put the inflation rate over the last three months below the Fed's target, and would have to be put on the list of indicators that could justify a rate cut in the coming months", point out Oddo BHF analysts.

Meanwhile, French household confidence improved again in January, according to the Insee synthetic indicator, which gained two points to 91, but remains well below its long-term average (100 between January 1987 and December 2023).

On the other hand, German household sentiment deteriorated sharply as February approached, according to the monthly survey by the GfK institute, further darkening the picture for the German economy at the start of the year.

The consumer sentiment index, calculated on the basis of a survey of 2,000 people, sank to -29.7 points, compared with -25.4 in January.

This morning, Brent crude is down 0.5%, at around $81.9 a barrel, while the euro is stable against the greenback, at around $1.084 a barrel.
On the bond front, the 10-year T-Bond is hovering around 4.1%, while its German equivalent, the Bund, is hovering around 2.25%.

In company news, Stef reports cumulative sales for 2023 of 4.44 billion euros, up 6.8% (+0.7% on a like-for-like basis and excluding sales of merchandise for out-of-home catering).

Rémy Cointreau announces sales of 956.6 million euros for the first nine months of its 2023-24 fiscal year, down 26.7% on a reported basis and 22.7% organically (up 16.7% on the first nine months of 2019-20).

Lastly, in line with its year-end announcements, Casino announces the completion of the sale of its 34.05% direct stake in Exito, as part of the takeover bids launched in the United States and Colombia by the Calleja group.

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