The European markets, undecided about the direction to take pending the opening of Wall Street, are constantly up and down: the CAC, the epicenter of the current financial crisis, loses 1,14%, the Ftse 100 rises by 0,32% and the Dax of 0,36%. The Ftse Mib, which fell by 14.30% at 3, is now traveling around parity.
Banco Popolare, Unicredit and Mps continue to lose more than two percentage points. French banking stocks are recovering: Société Générale is up by 1,74%, Crédit Agricole by 1,43% while Bnp Paribas is still negative, down by 1,77%. The panic that brought the lists into a nosedive between 2 and 3% was triggered by fears related to the soundness of French banks.
In the early afternoon Reuters, quoting banking sources, reported that “an Asian bank would have cut the credit lines granted to the main French lenders. And five other banks in Asia are reportedly reviewing their positions and counterparty risks, fearful of the exposure of French banks to the debt of peripheral countries of the euro area”.
The French Financial Markets Authority (AMF) promptly replied: "The regular functioning of the markets is affected by the diffusion of unfounded rumors concerning the financial securities listed in Paris". And he recalled that “the dissemination of unfounded information can constitute an offense susceptible to sanctions; the same goes for profiting from it.”
