European shares post fifth week of gains as earnings gather pace
By Kit Rees
LONDON (Reuters) - Well-received results from Spanish banks and a recovery among tech stocks lifted European shares to a fifth straight week of gains on Friday, its longest winning streak since September.
The pan-European STOXX 600 <.STOXX> index closed up 0.2 percent, a gain of 0.7 percent for a week when bank results were in focus.
Spain's BBVA (NYSE: BBVA) rose 2.4 percent and Caixabank
Britain's RBS (NYSE: RBS) was a laggard, reversing early gains to close 1.5 percent lower. Concern over a pending fine from the U.S. Department of Justice eclipsed its first-quarter update.
RBS was among the biggest fallers on the European banking index <.SX7P>, which declined 0.2 percent.
Finnish biofuel producer and oil refiner Neste
Satellite firm SES
Tech stocks <.SX8P> rose 0.8 percent following well-received results from Facebook (NASDAQ: FB), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and U.S. chipmakers.
Electrolux
French pharmaceutical group Sanofi
The earnings season has taken the focus off broader issues, such as global trade and geopolitics, which rattled markets in March. Worries about rising bond yields have also been away for now.
"We've been able to focus much more the earnings season and underlying trends," Mike van Dulken, head of research at Accendo Markets, said, adding that companies can be more cautious in the first quarter.
So far, around a quarter of companies in the MSCI EMU index have given first quarter updates. Nearly 60 percent have either beat or met analyst expectations, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S data. Earnings growth is clocking in at over 15 percent for the quarter, in dollar terms.
(Reporting by Kit Rees, additional reporting by Julien Ponthus; editing by Larry King)