European stocks rose for a third week as optimism grew that the worst of the global recession is over after reports showed the US economy lost fewer jobs than expected and Chinese manufacturing expanded for a third month last month.
Rio Tinto Group, the world’s third-largest mining company, gained 7.2 percent after raising US$21 billion from a share sale and an iron ore venture with BHP Billiton Ltd.
Renault SA and PSA Peugeot Citroen led a rally among automakers after French car sales advanced 12 percent last month as a government-backed bonus program enticed consumers.
Europe’s Dow Jones STOXX 600 Index rose 1.2 percent to 210.76 this past week, having risen for all but one of the last six weeks. The measure has gained 33 percent from a 12-year low on March 9 amid optimism that government action will help end the first global recession since World War II.
“The market is resuming its gains in a healthy manner, driven by improvements in the economy,” said Bruno Ducros, a fund manager at Cardif Asset Management in Paris, which oversees about US$2.6 billion in stocks. “Rio Tinto found a way to finance itself and that’s good.”
National benchmark indexes rose in 15 of the 18 western European markets. The UK’s FTSE 100 rose 0.5 percent, while Germany’s DAX gained 2.8 percent and France’s CAC 40 increased 1.9 percent.
UBS AG strategists reversed their preference for US stocks over European equities for the first time since 2007, saying US stocks look relatively expensive as the earnings gap between the two regions narrows. The brokerage raised its recommendation on European stocks to “overweight” and reduced US shares to “underweight.”
The European Central Bank and the Bank of England maintained their benchmark interest rates at record lows this past week.
European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet said the bank had no immediate plans to boost its 60 billion euro (US$84 billion) asset-purchase program or cut interest rates further as the economy shows signs of recovery.
NYSE Euronext CEO Duncan Niederauer said he was “a lot more confident” the three-month rally in equities would be sustainable as trading volume increased.
“At the end of March I was apprehensive because I thought the market had gone up so much so quickly that it didn’t feel like a fundamentally driven rally to me,” Niederauer said in an interview in Amsterdam on Wednesday.
“I was nervous that the fundamentals hadn’t really changed and we hadn’t seen enough volume,” he said.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
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