The IBEX 35 opened higher on Tuesday, breaking through the 14,150-point mark for the first time in 17 years during a session lacking major market catalysts. Investors remained focused on the mounting debt burden of the world’s largest economy, the United States, while awaiting updates on trade agreements.

Across the broader market, investors appeared unfazed by Moody’s recent downgrade of the U.S. credit rating, which came last week amid concerns over the country’s soaring $36 trillion debt pile. After a brief sell-off on Monday, U.S. Treasury bonds stabilized in Asian trading on Tuesday.

“Moody’s downgrade has been a temporary and fairly insignificant shock in the grand scheme of things,” said Kyle Rodda, financial markets analyst at Capital.com.

“But beyond that, we’re not getting any fresh news to prompt investor buying. (...) No new deals have come through.”

China and Australia announced interest rate cuts before European markets opened, in a bid to shield their economies from the fallout of the ongoing trade war.

“The session may be sideways or see a gentle drip, as markets await the key data releases later in the week,” analysts at Bankinter commented on their Telegram channel, referring to Wednesday’s UK inflation data, Thursday’s PMI figures from major global economies, and Japan’s CPI data on Friday.

“British and Japanese inflation could signal what’s coming in terms of prices, while the U.S. Manufacturing PMI may slip into contraction. None of this is positive, but for now, market liquidity pressure seems able to withstand it all,” Bankinter added.

Nevertheless, as of 0709 GMT on Tuesday, Spain’s blue-chip IBEX 35 index was up 86.00 points, or 0.61%, at 14,185.00, while the pan-European FTSE Eurofirst 300 index advanced 0.20%.

In the banking sector, Santander gained 0.71%, BBVA rose 0.85%, Caixabank climbed 1.34%, Sabadell added 1.12%, Bankinter was up 0.74%, and Unicaja Banco advanced 1.43%.

Among major non-financial stocks, Telefónica was up 0.20%, Inditex advanced 0.08%, Iberdrola gained 0.60%, Cellnex slipped 0.03%, and oil company Repsol rose 0.17%.

(Reporting by Benjamín Mejías Valencia; additional reporting by Ankur Banerjee and Johann M. Cherian; editing by Jorge Ollero Castela)