The Paris stock market (+0.9%) will attempt to win a double challenge between now and 5:35 p.m.: finish above 7,376pts (closing record of January 5, 2022) after having established a new absolute zenith at 7,387 around 11:33 a.m.

Even if the close doesn't live up to expectations, the CAC40 will have broken an absolute record on the eve of the '3 Witches' session.
Barring an unlikely accident, the CAC is set to post its 7th week of gains, extending to 20 weeks the upward trend that began at the end of September.
The CAC has gained 14% since January 1 and 30.5% since September 29.
For its part, the CAC40 'GR' peaked at 21,700 (i.e. 250pts higher than the previous day, and 600pts higher than on 5/1/2022).

The CAC40 is driven by Orange (+7%) and Airbus (+4.5%), which published their results this morning (see below).
The Euro-Stoxx50 also broke a record, but only for the year at 4.316, while the DAX climbed to 15,634 (also its 2023 zenith)... but these 2 indices fell back to +0.4% and +0.2% respectively, while Wall Street remains in the red, with the Dow Jones at -0.6%, the S&P500 and the Nasdaq at -0.5% (the Nasdaq lost -1.3% shortly after the opening, but its recovery is considered encouraging).

The apparent euphoria of mid-day in Europe was slightly dampened by a flurry of macroeconomic indicators in the United States, 3 out of 4 of which were more robust than expected: "good news" became "bad news" in view of the prospect of a further rate cut... which would therefore be postponed by several months.
Producer prices rose by +0.7% in January in the United States (vs. +0.4% expected), mainly in the wake of the rebound in energy costs.

The Labor Department announced on Thursday that PPI rose by +6% over 12 months to the end of January, in the wake of energy prices, which climbed by 5.4% in January after falling by 10.3% in December.

Excluding core data, i.e. food, energy and business services, producer prices rose by 0.6% in January, their steepest rate of increase since March 2022.
Over 12 months, the rise was 4.5% instead of the 4.3% anticipated.
Conclusion: the price decline (-0.2% in December) has come to a halt, and this could prompt a review of the scenario of a continued fall in 2023.

US jobless claims fell by -1000 in the week to February 6, to 194,000 from 195,000 the previous week (revised from 196,000), according to the Labor Department, whereas a rise towards 200.000 had been expected.

A small blip in the picture of a US economy on the verge of overheating: the Commerce Department reported a 4.5% decline in US housing starts last month, to an annualized rate of 1,309,000, below economists' expectations.

U.S. building permits - which are supposed to foreshadow future housing starts - remained stable (+0.1%) at an annualized rate of 1,339,000 in January, thus slightly missing the market consensus: it seems illusory to expect a real turnaround in the trend, as U.S. long-term yields are climbing again (+4pts to 3.894% on the 30-year).

These statistics will not reassure Wall Street about the Federal Reserve's interest-rate management, resulting in a strong dollar (1.0675/E, i.e. +0.1%) and a recovery in bond yields.
The inversion of the US yield curve remains impressive, with the '6-month' and '1-year' yields testing 5.0300% and 5.0200% respectively this afternoon.
The yield on 10-year US Treasuries has risen +3pts to 3.8380%, leading to a deterioration in Europe, with OATs at 2.95% (vs. 2.944% on Wednesday and 2.99% at the green high of 3.45pm) and Bunds at 2.4900% (vs. 2.474%).... and Italian BTPs add +6Pts to 3.3900%.

In company news, Orange unveils net income for 2022 of 2.62 billion euros, compared with 778 million in 2021, and organic cash flow from telecom activities up 27.4% to 3.06 billion, in line with its target of at least 2.9 billion.

Pernod Ricard has reported a 29% increase in net income, group share, to 1.79 billion euros for its first half 2022-23, mainly reflecting a rise in operating income recurring (+12% in terms of organic growth) to 2.42 billion.

Renault Group claims a significant improvement in profitability for 2022, with net income from continuing operations up by 1.1 billion euros to 1.6 billion euros, and an automotive operating margin of 3.3%.

Finally, Airbus reported net income up 6% to 1.68 billion euros for the last three months of the year, on sales up 21% to 20.64 billion euros.


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