Europe open: Stocks dip even as ECB's Draghi sounds confident note

Stocks on the Continent have given up their early gains despite 'dovish' sounding remarks from Mario Draghi, the head of the European Central Bank.

Speaking at a press conference in Frankfurt, Draghi said the monetary authority should perhaps look at ways to soften the "side effects, if any" of negative interest rates.

Nonetheless, he went on to add "that said, low bank profitability is not an inevitable consequence of negative rates".

Draghi also sounded a confident note on the economic outlook, saying that a 'soft patch' does not necessarily foreshadow a serious slump.

Be that as it may, as of 1014 GMT the benchmark Stoxx 600 was down by 0.33% to 376.0, alongside a drop of 0.37% to 11,377.61 for the German Dax and a decline of 0.37% to 21,060.25 on the FTSE Mibtel.

In the background meanwhile, all eyes were on a slew of indicative votes in the UK Parliament, which were scheduled to start from 1900 GMT, to map out how lawmakers wished to proceed with the UK's withdrawal from the European Union.

Ahead of those, the pound was drifting lower by 0.10% to 1.1715 versus the single currency, with euro/dollar little changed, edging higher by 0.09% to 1.12762.

US-China trade talks weren't far from traders' minds either, with US President Donald Trump on Tuesday having reportedly told Senator Marco Rubio that he would not settle for less than an "excellent deal".

America's Trade Representative, Robert Lighthizer, and Secretary of the Treasury, Steve Mnuchin, were set to travel to Beijing on Thursday for the next round of negotiations between the two economic powerhouses.

INSEE's French consumer confidence index edged higher in March to 96.0 after a reading of 95.0 in the month before.

Further south, ISTAT reported that its Italian consumer confidence index for that same month dropped to a level of 111.2 (consensus: 112.5), after a reading of 112.4 for the month before.

For later in the day, the US Commerce Department was scheduled to publish foreign trade data covering the month of January at 1330 GMT.

On the corporate side of things, mergers and acquisitions were again dominating the headlines after the Financial Times reported that French car-maker Renault was targeting taking up merger talks again with Nissan Motor, within 12 months.

Swedbank was a top faller following alleged revelations that the Nordic lender misled US authorities and that its Stockholm headquarters had been raided by authorities as part of a probe into further allegations of insider trading.