The Paris Bourse is set to open slightly higher on Friday morning, with investors wary of taking too many risks as they await the publication of several indicators in the services sector.

At around 8:15 a.m., the 'future' contract on the CAC 40 index - March delivery - was up 17 points at 7310.5 points, heralding a green start to the session.

After a gloomy morning, the Paris market had managed to regain its equilibrium point on Thursday, before moving back into positive territory in the afternoon to end the day with a gain of 0.7% at 7284 points.

Although inflation, which is slow to subside, continues to worry investors, equity markets are still proving highly resilient, as illustrated by the CAC's current week-to-date gain of over 1.3%.

And while global growth is surprisingly on the up, its strength also shows that the massive rate hikes decided in the USA and Europe have so far failed to significantly curb activity.

Inflation is receding, but in a disorderly fashion, with the wage dimension still a cause for concern", explains Emmanuel Auboyneau, Associate Manager at Amplegest.

"Faced with this situation, central banks are questioning themselves, and could extend their restrictive policies for longer than expected", adds the professional.

Doubts surrounding the evolution of the monetary policies of the major central banks continue to drive bond yields higher, with French OATs and German Bunds setting new records.

In Europe, the start of the session will be punctuated by the results of the monthly purchasing managers' surveys (PMI) on services activity in the eurozone economies.

The latest PMIs, which all came in well above the 50-point expansion threshold, dismissed the risk of an imminent recession on the Old Continent by showing that the services sector was on a roll.

Demand is up, bottlenecks in production lines are receding, and consumer confidence is on the rise again", stresses Philippe de Gouville, CEO and co-founder of fintech Ismo.

Investors are also awaiting the release, at 4:00 pm, of the ISM services index in the United States, expected to show a slight decline in February, although still in expansion territory

Yesterday, Wall Street finished higher, buoyed by the surge of cloud-based enterprise software developer Salesforce, which soared by more than 11% after forecasts that impressed the market.

The Dow Jones gained over 1%, the S&P 500 gained nearly 0.8% and the Nasdaq Composite gained over 0.7%.

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