Euro Shares Rebound with No News on US-Iran Tensions

LONDON, U.K. – During the past two trading sessions, the European stock market declined, but on Tuesday, most stocks rebound with the lack of new headlines regarding the escalating geopolitical tensions between the US and Iran.

Euro stocks traded higher on Tuesday, with the pan-European Stoxx 600 index recording a 0.75 increase during the early trading session. The increase was mainly boosted by the 1.4% gains in the technology shares as major bourses, and all sectors headed into the black.

Meanwhile, the main focus in the market at the moment remains towards the geopolitical developments after the airstrike of the US, targeting the top military commander of Iran. Most of the equity markets experienced the brunt of the tension after the death of commander Qasem Soleimani, which caused the market to go down in the last two sessions. Fortunately, with no new escalation on the US-Iran tensions, the market was boosted back up.

However, despite the mostly positive session for the market, confusion starts to rise following a letter that recently surfaced showing that Washington is planning to pull its troops from Iraq, only to be countered by a statement from Defense Secretary Esper saying that the letter is inconsistent and that there hasn’t been any final decision reached yet.

Elsewhere, equities in the Asian stock market rose with Japan as the top gainer for the day. The country’s Topix index and the Nikkei 225 index both increased by around 1.5%. Further, MSCI’s biggest index of Asian shares outside of Japan also increased for the day, albeit modestly, at 0.8%.

Back in the European market, aside from keeping an eye on the geopolitical tensions between the US and Iran, investors are also monitoring the political improvement in Spain. Later in the day, the majority expects the Socialist leader Pedro Sanchez to get enough support from the parliament for his coalition government.

In the data front, market players are also on the lookout for the latest inflation figures from the eurozone, Italy, and Switzerland, including the November retail sales of Europe.

On shares on the move, the stocks of the British retailer Marks & Spencer increased by around 4% during the early session on Tuesday, while the Danish jewelry company Pandora and communications behemoth Nokia both recorded around a 3% increase.

Meanwhile, some other European benchmark wasn’t able to hop on the uptrend on Tuesday. The Rentokil stocks went down by around 4% for the day while shares of British automaker Aston Martin lost 8% after its profit warning statement.