European stocks advanced on Wednesday, with a strong session on Wall Street overnight, encouraging earnings reports and upbeat exports data from Germany helping underpin investor sentiment.
German exports increased unexpectedly in December, data released by Destatis revealed earlier in the day.
Exports were up 0.9 percent month-on-month in December. Although this was weaker than the 1.8 percent increase seen in November, the monthly growth confounded the expected fall of 0.2 percent. On a yearly basis, exports advanced 15.6 percent.
As inflation concerns mount, investors await the release of U.S. inflation data this week for clues on the pace of Federal Reserve policy tightening.
The pan European Stoxx Europe 600 jumped 1.5 percent to 472.13 after ending flat with a positive bias the previous day.
The German DAX and France’s CAC 40 index both climbed around 1.5 percent, while the U.K.’s FTSE 100 was up 0.6 percent.
Danish jewelry maker Pandora soared 7 percent after it reported full-year earnings in line with preliminary results and proposed a new 3.3 billion Danish kroner ($506.2 million) share buyback.
Dutch Insurer Aegon NV plunged 5 percent after posting a decline in fourth-quarter earnings.
ABN Amro tumbled 3.8 percent despite reporting stronger than expected fourth-quarter earnings.
Smurfit Kappa Group, an Irish corrugated packaging company, rallied 2.2 percent after delivering record earnings despite “significant and unprecedented cost inflation” in 2021.
Pharmaceuticals giant GlaxoSmithKline was little changed after its pre-tax profits dropped last year.
Barratt Developments gained nearly 1 percent after the housebuilder reported a slight rise in pretax profit for the first half of fiscal 2022.
Grainger jumped 3 percent. The provider of private rental housing reported a strong performance for the start of financial year.
German optical products company Jenoptik gained 1 percent after its preliminary total revenue for fiscal year 2021 rose to 895 million euros from prior year’s 767.2 million euros.
Siemens Energy rallied 2.5 percent. After posting a 240 million euro ($274 million) first-quarter net loss, the company said it expects sharp improvement in net profit in 2022.
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