European shares inch up on earnings bump, higher yields weigh

Focus was on luxury stocks, with shares of Hermes adding 4.5% after the Birkin bag maker's sales jumped in the fourth quarter. Weighing on the index, L'Oreal dropped 6.3% after the French cosmetics maker missed fourth quarter sales estimates as Chinese travellers spent less on shopping, according to traders.

European shares inched higher at open on Friday on strong performances in healthcare stocks and video games group Ubisoft after quarterly results, though gains were limited by higher government bond yields as traders pulled back their interest rate cut bets.

The pan-European STOXX 600 index was up 0.1%, as of 0822 GMT. Ubisoft jumped nearly 14% after the video games group reported third quarter net bookings slightly above its forecast.

Healthcare stocks led advances, helped by a more than 9% rise in both Danish medical equipment maker Coloplast and German med-tech firm Carl Zeiss Meditec AG after first-quarter results. Focus was on luxury stocks, with shares of Hermes adding 4.5% after the Birkin bag maker's sales jumped in the fourth quarter.

Weighing on the index, L'Oreal dropped 6.3% after the French cosmetics maker missed fourth quarter sales estimates as Chinese travellers spent less on shopping, according to traders. Hurting equities, the yield on the German 10-year government bond rose for third-straight session, last at 2.380%, as markets pulled back their bets of an early interest rate cut from the European Central Bank.

Money markets now see around 113 basis points (bps) of cuts this year, from around 140 bps a week earlier.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)