Europe close: Technology and Autos pace gains
Stocks pushed higher after a stronger-than-expected update from Netflix light a fire under technology issues and amid a flurry of news on the M&A front.
There were also some positive headlines on the international trade front, which helped to drive gains in Automobile stocks.
Commenting on the market backdrop, Josh Mahony at IG told clients: "US corporate earnings outperformance is helping drive gains in stock markets across the board this afternoon. A bullish set of figures from Netflix have helped drive the tech sector higher, amid hopes that we are set to leave the Facebook privacy fears crisis behind."
By the closing bell, the benchmark Stoxx 600 had risen 0.80% or 3.03 points to 380.77, alongside a gain of 1.57% or 194.16 points for Germany's Dax to 12,585.57 and an advance of 0.76% on the Cac-40 to 5,353.54.
Meanwhile, euro/dollar was down 0.30% at 1.2346.
At the sector level, the best performance was put in by Technology, with the Stoxx 600 sector gauge jumping 1.98% to 447.11 as shares of Netflix surged on the other side of the Pond after the streaming video provider posted a first quarter subscriber numbers which trounced analysts' forecasts.
Domestic net subscriber adds over the three months to 31 March printed at 1.96m, a third more than had been anticipated by analysts, while the increase in those overseas beat the consensus by 9%.
Tailing that gain were companies in the Autos&parts space after Beijing promised to increase access for foreign carmakers to its market.
Nevertheless, economic data out on the Continent on Tuesday was less than inspiring and came alongside mixed readings on GDP and industrial production in China overnight.
In particular, the ZEW institute's economic confidence index for Germany retreated from a reading of +5.1 for March to -8.2 in April (consensus: -1.0) - its lowest level since November 2012.
Despite that weak reading, Jessica Hinds at Capital Economics said: "Admittedly, the hard data for Q1 so far have been particularly weak. But this in part reflects temporary effects related to the weather and a flu outbreak.
"And while Germany is vulnerable to increased protectionism, at this stage we doubt that an all-out trade war will materialise. Meanwhile, with the new grand coalition set to loosen fiscal policy slightly, we remain fairly optimistic about the outlook."
Earlier, ISTAT had reported that Italy's harmonised consumer price index printed at up by 0.9% year-on-year in March, undershooting a preliminary estimate of 1.1%.
Intrum Justitia surged after the Swedish outfit tabled a €3.6bn bid for Intesa Sanpaolo's debt collection arm and its €10.8bn of bad debt.
In other M&A news, France's Sanofi disclosed it was in exclusive talks with Advent International to dispose of its Zentiva generic drug division for €1.9bn.
Still in the euro area's second-largest economy, grocer Casino Guichard posted a 3.1% jump in first quarter sales.
Further South, in Spain, toll-road operator Abertis's board gave the green light to a joint bid by ACS and Atlantia.