Stocks rallied on Monday as oil prices slipped but investors remained cautious while they waited for central banks to give their first indications of how the Middle East conflict will hit interest rates.
Central banks in the US, euro area, Britain, Japan and elsewhere will all meet this week for the first time since the war started, giving clues on how rising crude prices could hit borrowing charges.
DUBLIN
The Dublin market slipped on what dealers said was a mostly quiet day.
Housebuilder Glenveagh fell 3.47 per cent to €1.974. Dealers blamed “nervous investors” cashing in some of the profits earned on the stock over the last year for the move.
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Rival Cairn Homes was down 2.42 per cent at €2.22.
Food business Glanbia shed 1.48 per cent to €17.36. Dealers noted that there was no particular reason for the move.
AIB edged 0.5 per cent down to €8.90 while Bank of Ireland dipped 0.58 per cent to €15.48.
Leading stocks, airline Ryanair and food and ingredients business Kerry, fell at similar rates.
Ryanair closed 0.55 per cent down at €25.47 while Kerry was 0.79 per cent off at €69.05.
LONDON
London’s FTSE 100 rose on Monday as falling oil prices lifted sentiment across stock markets and investors looked to this week’s Bank of England meeting.
However, energy stocks rose despite the fall in crude prices.
Oil major BP climbed 1.12 per cent to close at 540.3 pence sterling. Rival Shell gained 1.41 per cent to 3,415p.
Dundrum Town Centre part owner, listed property group Hammerson, soared 4.12 per cent to 328.6p on the back of an upgrade from Morgan Stanley analysts.
Real estate investment trust Segro gained 2.85 per cent to 743.2p as analysts also boosted its shares.
Among other movers, Close Brothers tumbled 13.9 per cent after short seller Viceroy Research posted a report on its website saying it was short the financial services firm.
Irish building materials giant CRH advanced 1.8 per cent to 7,664p after revealing plans to ditch its London listing. The multinational’s premier listing is in New York.
EUROPE
The pan-European Stoxx 600 index rose on Monday, appearing poised to break three days of declines.
Italy’s UniCredit made a €35 billion bid for Commerzbank, allowing it to take its stake above 30 per cent and increase its influence over the German rival despite fierce opposition from Berlin to a full takeover.
Commerzbank’s shares were up more than 8 per cent at €32.14 shortly after 5pm Irish time following news of the bid. UniCredit had gained around half a per cent at €63.84. The Italian bank’s stock had fallen up to 2.6 per cent earlier.
NEW YORK
The tech-heavy Nasdaq led Wall Street’s main stock indexes higher on Monday, with Meta among the top gainers after a report said the megacap was preparing for sweeping AI-related lay-offs, while the Middle East conflict kept risk-taking in check.
Meta gained 2.6 per cent after Reuters reported that the company plans to shrink its workforce by 20 per cent or more to offset costly artificial-intelligence infrastructure bets and prepare for greater efficiency brought about by AI-assisted workers.
AI is expected to stay in the spotlight this week, with chip giant Nvidia’s chief executive, Jensen Huang, set to reveal new chips and software at the company’s annual developer conference later in the day. The chipmaker gained 2.6 per cent.
Tesla rose 2.1 per cent as Elon Musk said the company’s Terafab project to make AI chips will launch in seven days.
Meanwhile, chipmaker Micron climbed 6.3 per cent following the announcement of the company’s plans for a second manufacturing facility in Taiwan.
