The Paris stock market climbed 0.2% to around 7330 points on the eve of a four-day Easter weekend, despite the decline of luxury goods stocks, which are the red lanterns of the CAC this morning, with -2.2% for Kering, -1.9% for L'Oréal, -1.3% for LVMH and -1.1% for Hermès.

It should be noted that all Euronext European markets will be closed tomorrow (Good Friday) and will remain closed until Easter Monday inclusive, while the US markets will remain closed only this Friday.

Against this backdrop, investors prefer to limit risk, especially as the publication of monthly US employment statistics is due tomorrow, and players will only be able to react to them once the weekend is over.

According to expectations, this report should show a slower pace of hiring in the USA in March, with 225,000 new jobs expected, compared with 311,000 in February.

Still on the statistics front, investors will be able to take note of the weekly jobless claims figures for the USA early this afternoon, in the hope that this figure will not confirm the hypothesis of a serious slowdown in the labor market.

Meanwhile, market players were able to discover the industrial production figures for Germany in the morning. According to Destatis, production rose by 2% between January and February 2023, following a 3.7% increase (revised from a provisional figure of +3.5%) in January.

As a result, the adjusted production index since December 2022 has risen by 5.8%, more than offsetting the significant decline recorded in December (-2.4%)', stresses the Federal Statistics Office.

In February, production in industry excluding energy and construction rose by 2.4% on January, growth driven in particular by a 7.6% jump in the manufacture of motor vehicles and parts, Germany's leading industrial sector.

The latest economic news has done nothing to encourage optimism recently, with some analysts now expecting a deeper-than-expected recession in the US, possibly as early as the second quarter.

With the release of disappointing macroeconomic indicators, the likelihood of a further interest rate hike in the US in May has fallen slightly, according to the CME Group's FedWatch barometer.

The remoteness of a new Fed monetary tightening is weighing on US government bond yields, a downward movement favored by the cautious mood ahead of the employment figures.

This morning, the yield on 10-year Treasuries is hovering around 3.28%, its lowest level since last September.

Having approached the 1.1000 resistance level against the dollar again yesterday, the single currency retreated over the hours to 1.09, following mixed statistics on both sides of the Atlantic.

Oil markets were also weakened by fears that the current economic slowdown could turn into a global recession, with Brent crude down 0.4% to $84.6 this morning.

In the news for French companies, Trigano announced that it had entered into exclusive negotiations to acquire almost 100% of the capital of Loisirs Evasion, Loisirs 40, Loisirs 47 and ATC 64 (Alonso group).

Bouygues announced on Thursday that the Paris Court of Appeal had dismissed an appeal by its subsidiary Bouygues Telecom in its dispute with Free Mobile.

Savencia Fromage & Dairy announced the acquisition of Sucesores de Alfredo Williner, one of Argentina's leading dairy companies, collecting high-quality milk for its industrial sites in the province of Santa Fe.

Finally, Orange announces the issue of a billion euros of undated deeply subordinated notes, 'taking advantage of favorable market conditions reflected by the absence of a new issue premium'.

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