The Paris stock market gained nearly 0.5% this morning, around 7,630 points, driven in particular by Alstom (+2.7%), Teleperformance (+2.4%) and Stellantis (+2%).

Investors should nevertheless limit risk-taking ahead of the publication of the US employment report, to be unveiled by the Labor Department at 2:30pm.

Investors are awaiting confirmation of the trend towards a slowdown in the pace of job creation, which would validate the scenario of a soft landing evoked this week by the Federal Reserve.

However, this hypothesis must now be confirmed by the labor market figures, which have generally surprised on the upside in recent months.

The consensus forecast is for a deceleration in job creation to 180,000 in January, compared with 216,000 in January.000 in January, compared with 216,000 in December, as well as a month-on-month rise in the unemployment rate from 3.7% to 3.8%.

From the analysts' point of view, the US labor market should therefore continue to slow slowly but surely.

'One of the issues for the Fed now is to make its policy less restrictive to avoid a sharp rise in layoffs and hence in the unemployment rate', explains Bastien Drut, Head of Strategy and Economic Research at CPR AM.

On the statistics front, production in France's manufacturing industry rose between November and December (+1.2% after +0.2%) and in industry as a whole (+1.1% after +0.5%), according to Insee's seasonally and working-day adjusted data.

Over the next few hours, the markets will be informed of the industrial orders figures and the Michigan consumer confidence index.

The performance of US oil giants ExxonMobil and Chevron will also enliven the session at midday.

It's worth noting, however, that macroeconomic data are solid, inflation is easing, monetary policymakers are ready to loosen their stance, and earnings releases of late have been very strong", emphasized Danske Bank staff this morning.

"In these conditions, it's going to take more than bad news from the banks, geopolitical concerns and a real estate crisis in China to trip up the equity markets", said the Danish bank.

In company news, Bonduelle last night reported sales of €1,213m for the 1st half of 2023/24 (July-December 23), up +4.5% on a like-for-like basis (constant exchange rates and scope of consolidation) and down -2.4% on a reported basis.

Vinci announces that Swedish energy group Vattenfall has awarded its subsidiary Nuvia a major six-year contract to dismantle units 1 and 2 of the Ringhals nuclear power plant in Sweden.

Finally, ublicis announces that an agreement has been reached between the US Attorneys General concerning the work carried out by the former Rosetta advertising agency on behalf of opioid manufacturers, bringing three years of discussions to a close.

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