The Paris stock market has stagnated since the opening between 7,320 and 7,340, i.e. exactly the same fluctuation corridor as the previous day (90% of trading took place between these 2 limits), with the flagship index clawing back 0.2%, with the same 7330-point pivot that had "anchored" trading the previous day.
Volumes remain worthy of an August low (1.45 bn euros traded in 6.5 hours): traders are taking no initiative ahead of a four-day Easter weekend.
The CAC is suffering from a (rare) collective decline in luxury stocks: -1.8% for LVMH and Hermès, -2.2% for Kering, -3% for L'Oréal.
The Euro-Stoxx50 also gained +0.2% to 4,305. Outside the Eurozone, the FT-100 stood out in London with +0.9%.
Wall Street has just reopened slightly lower with -0.2% to 33,400pts on the Dow, -0.4% on the S&P500 and -0.7% on the Nasdaq (after -1.1% the previous day).

It should be noted that all Euronext's 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 jobs expected to be created, compared with 311,000 new positions in February.

Investors took note of the number of weekly jobless claims in the USA: these apparently fell by 18,000 in the week to March 27, to 228,000 compared with 246,000 the previous week (a figure that was heavily revised from the 198.000 announced last week, due to a change in the calculation methodology, according to the Labor Department).

The number of people receiving regular benefits rose by 6,000 to 1,823,000 (revised from 1,689,000) in the week ended March 20, the last week available for this statistic.

In Europe, market players were able to discover the German industrial production figures in the morning. According to Destatis, this 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.

Bond markets remain fairly stable on the eve of a long weekend, punctuated tomorrow by the publication of the NFP (when traders will be on vacation): spreads are below 1Pt on OATs and Bunds, and the yield on US ten-year Treasuries is up +1.5Pt to 3.302%, which remains close to the lowest level since last September.
Little movement on the FOREX, with the euro down 0.1% against the dollar at 1.0890.

In French company news, 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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