MW: European shares on track for eighth day of gains
Porsche Holding up after results; Danone signs deal to merge CIS operations
By Sarah Turner , MarketWatch
LONDON (MarketWatch) -- European shares rose in early trade Friday, which if sustained through the session would take a winning run to eight sessions, with banks gaining on Friday as investors hoped for more certainty over loans and debt exposure.
The Stoxx Europe 600 index (ST:SXXP 256.36, +1.48, +0.58%) rose 0.4% to 255.83.
On Thursday, the index ended up 0.2%, having gained 6.2% over seven days to reach its highest closing level since May 13.
Banks have risen 4.7% this week, including a 0.5% gain on Friday. Worries about sovereign debt in Europe have retreated and European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said late Thursday that stress tests on European banks will be published in July.
"The announcement of the stress tests had not been expected given strong opposition, particularly from regional banks in Germany," said strategists at Davy Stockbrokers. "The united front in Europe should help assuage fears over banks loan books and sovereign debt exposures," they added.
Societe Generale (FR:GLE 38.15, +1.01, +2.72%) shares were up 1.5% and Credit Agricole (FR:ACA 9.65, +0.34, +3.65%) shares rose 1.5%,
The sector gained support on Thursday after a bond auction in Spain helped sentiment toward the country's finances and BBVA (ES:BBVA 9.25, +0.39, +4.37%) shares were up 1.3% on Friday.
The Spanish Ibex 35 index rose 0.6% to 9,812.70.
Of the major regional benchmarks, the U.K. FTSE 100 index (UK:UKX 5,284, +29.67, +0.57%) rose 0.2% to 5,263.33, the German DAX index (DX:DAX 6,237, +13.14, +0.21%) edged up 0.1% to 6,227.36 and the French CAC-40 index (FR:PX1 3,695, +11.99, +0.33%) advanced 0.1% to 3,688.32.
Asian shares were mixed and U.S. stock futures were pointing to a retreat on Wall Street with Dow Jones Industrial Average futures down 18 points.
Light sweet crude oil futures edged down 39 cents at $76.45 a barrel, while copper futures lost 1 cent to trade at $2.90 per pound.
Of commodity-sector firms, oil giant BP (UK:BP. 377.50, +17.80, +4.95%) (BP 31.71, -0.14, -0.44%) gained 2.4%, paring quarter-to-date losses to 40.6%.
BP's chief executive, Tony Hayward, told a congressional panel Thursday that it's still too early to determine the exact cause of the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion on April 20 and subsequent oil leak. Read more on BP.
It posted an after-tax loss of around 700 million euros ($866.7 million) for the nine months of its July 31 fiscal year. The result was hit by restructuring as well as a capital increase at Volkswagen that reduced Porsche's holding in Volkswagen to 32.2% from 37.4%.
Porsche said that its net liquidity position "improved dramatically" and it expects to report a loss of less than 1 billion euros for its fiscal year, which it said is an improvement on earlier forecasts.
Shares of French dairy firm Danone (FR:BN 44.49, +0.40, +0.90%) rose 0.8% after signing a deal to merge its fresh dairy products businesses in the CIS area with those of Russia's Unimilk.
