Europe midday: Stocks hold lower amid Italy, trade war concerns
European stocks are holding in the red as investors mark down the value of Italian assets after two leading Eurosceptics were named to the top spots on two key parliamentary committees in Rome.
Investors woke up on Thursday to find that the far-right League's Claudio Borghi and Alberto Bagnai had been chosen to head up the lower chamber's Budget Committee and the Senate Finance Committee, respectively.
By 1415, the benchmark Stoxx 600 was down by 0.44% or 1.68 points to 382.58, alongside a drop of 0.98% or 12.06 points to 12,571.26 for the German Dax.
But it was the FTSE Mibtel that was doing worst out of the Continent's main benchmarks, retreating by 1.36% or 303.11 points to 21,820.18.
In parallel, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Italian government note was up by 14 basis points at 2.69%, while euro/dollar had turned around to trade up by 0.14% to 1.15879.
In the background meantime, global trade tensions continued to percolate through markets after China's Commerce Ministry warned that the country stood ready to retaliate against the enactment of any new tariffs by Washington.
On the corporate side of things, auto stocks were weakest, with the Stoxx 600's sector gauge skidding 2.63% lower to 579.60.
Weighing on investor sentiment towards the sector was a warning from Daimler about the impact that trade tariffs will have on it.
Nevertheless, come Thursday there was some unconfirmed 'market chatter' making the rounds that Beijing and Washington were talking to each other in order to avert tariffs.
Along similar lines, the Journal was reporting that German carmakers were lobbying for the simultaneous removal of EU (10%) and US (2.5%) car tariffs.
Still in Germany, insurer Allianz was sharing the spotlight on the back of a report in Manager Magazin - that was denied by the company itself - that it was planning to axe at least 5,000 jobs in its home market.
Economic data was again light on the ground on Thursday, with INSEE's business confidence index for France printing at 106.0 for June, unchanged from the month before, while that for manufacturing came in at a reading of 110.0 (consensus: 108.0).
Commenting on the figures, Claus Vistesen at Pantheon Macroeconomics told clients: "The headline manufacturing sentiment index in France was unchanged at 110 in June following an upward revision to the May data, above the consensus, 108.
"The aggregate business confidence index was unchanged at 106 in June, also in line with the consensus."