European Shares Poised For Mixed Start

European stocks may open mixed on Thursday taking cues from Asian markets following broadly negative Wall Street trading overnight, amid U.S. Federal Reserve’s rate hike move that was widely expected.

Traders are likely to react to the US Fed’s decision to raise interest rate by 25 basis points and its signaling of another rate hike despite recent turmoil in the banking industry.

Investors also may be concerned about the health of the banking industry after US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen commented that the regulators are not looking to provide any “blanket” deposit insurance to stabilise the US banking system, without working with law makers.

In Europe, investors are awaiting interest rate decisions by Bank Of England as well as Norway Central Bank. Further, Swiss National Bank Monetary Policy announcement is also awaited today.

Asian stock markets were trading mixed on Thursday. The Australian stock market and Japanese stock market are notably lower, while Shanghai, Hang Seng and Taiwan markets are trading higher.

The U.S. dollar weakened against other major currencies in the Asian session on Thursday.

On Wall Street, the major averages finished the session at their worst levels of the day. The Dow plunged 530.49 points or 1.6 percent to 32,030.11, the Nasdaq tumbled 190.15 points or 1.6 percent to 11,669.96 and the S&P 500 dove 65.90 points or 1.7 percent to 3,936.97.

Meanwhile, the major European markets closed higher on Wednesday after a cautious session. The pan European Stoxx 600 gained 0.15 percent, and the U.K.’s FTSE 100 Index climbed by 0.41 percent. The French CAC 40 Index rose by 0.26 percent and the German DAX Index inched up by 0.14 percent.

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