BLBG: European Stocks Fall as Siemens Disappoints, Greek Banks Slide
European stocks declined from a seven-year high, snapping their longest winning streak since April, as Siemens AG and Royal Philips NV posted disappointing earnings, and Greek stocks tumbled.
Siemens slid 2.8 percent, leading industrial companies lower, after Europe’s largest engineering firm reported a drop in first-quarter profit. Philips lost 5.3 percent after saying it is behind on its 2016 financial targets. Greek banks dragged a gauge of lenders to the second-biggest loss of the 19 industry groups in the Stoxx Europe 600 Index.
The Stoxx 600 slipped 0.6 percent to 370.12 at 12:32 p.m. in London. The index on Monday capped eight days of gains amid optimism about European Central Bank stimulus, while Greek shares slid as opposition party Syriza won the election on Sunday. The Swiss Market Index rose 0.9 percent, its third day of gains, as Swiss National Bank (SNBN) Vice President Jean-Pierre Danthine said it is willing to intervene in currency markets even after giving up its cap on the franc.
“With Siemens, it’s worrying in the sense that Germany’s an industrial power and a good part of their business is exports,” Jasper Lawler, a market analyst at CMC Markets Plc in London, said by telephone. “There’s going to be a lot of focus on the negotiations between Greece and the Troika. Whenever we hear parties involved making commentary, there’s going to be volatility. It’s adding to the distrust of how the euro zone functions.”
The ASE Index fell for a second day, erasing its Friday rally, as new Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras took office promising to end austerity. The gauge dropped 4.3 percent, with Eurobank Ergasias SA, National Bank of Greece SA, and Piraeus Bank SA plunging at least 13 percent to record lows.
National benchmark equity indexes of Italy and Spain dropped at least 0.8 percent, while France’s CAC 40 Index and Germany’s DAX Index lost more than 1 percent.
Among stocks bucking the downward trend, EasyJet Plc rose 2.5 percent after posting an increase in first-quarter revenue.
(In an earlier version of this story, the financial-target timescale for Philips was corrected.)
To contact the reporters on this story: Alan Soughley in Frankfurt at asoughley@bloomberg.net; Inyoung Hwang in London at ihwang7@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Cecile Vannucci at cvannucci1@bloomberg.net Alan Soughley, Namitha Jagadeesh
