The Paris Bourse is set to open on a weak note on Friday morning, heading for a second consecutive week of declines despite the buoyant news of the past few days.

At around 8:15 a.m., the future contract on the CAC 40 index - June delivery - dropped 46.5 points to 8039.5, suggesting an opening below the 8100-point threshold.

The Paris market's restlessness follows on from last night's sharp decline on Wall Street, where rising bond yields fuelled investor nervousness.

At this stage of the week, the CAC is down 0.8%. In New York, the major indices are also heading for a negative week, with the Dow Jones down by over 2% and the Nasdaq by 0.3%.

This setback seems hard to explain, however, on the basis of the week's news flow, marked by Nvidia's stratospheric results and PMI indices attesting to the economic recovery in Europe.

This trend reversal may well be due to a desire on the part of investors to take a few profits at a time when the world's stock markets have been flying from record to record recently.

In addition to profit-taking, the downward trend can be attributed to the uncertainty surrounding the timing of future Fed rate cuts, a situation largely reinforced by the cautious 'minutes' published this week by the institution.

On the bond market, the yield on 10-year Treasury bonds resumed an upward slope this week to flirt with the 4.50% mark yesterday, having fallen to one-month lows last week.

In view of the strong performance recorded by equity markets since the beginning of May, which was precisely due to a fall in bond yields, this served as an excuse to take partial profits", explain Danske Bank's teams.

Investors are now looking ahead to the day's statistics, starting with durable goods orders and the Michigan consumer confidence index, due to be published in the afternoon in the USA.

Although the stock market downturn has calmed the game somewhat after the recording of numerous all-time highs, the positive trend remains intact, according to some strategists.

According to analysts at Swiss private bank Lombard Odier, stock markets should continue to rise in 2024.

'The scenario of resilient global growth and falling inflation remains valid, despite short-term uncertainties', emphasize Luca Bindelli, Head of Investment Strategy, and Edmund Ng, Senior Equity Strategist.

These buoyant winds for the equity markets should continue into 2024", say the two specialists.

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