After gaining up to 0.6% at mid-day and briefly reaching the 7,400-point mark, the CAC40 gave up its gains in the second half of the day, finally closing the session at equilibrium, at 7,344 points (-0.01%).

In today's statistics, industrial producer prices fell by 0.5% in the eurozone and by 0.6% in the EU, according to Eurostat estimates, following sequential declines of 2.8% in the eurozone and 2.3% in the EU in January.

Compared with February 2022, industrial producer prices rose by 13.2% in the eurozone and by 14.5% in the EU, against annual variations of +15.1% and +16.4% respectively observed in January.

In addition, following a 2.1% fall in January (initially revised from -1.6%), US industrial orders contracted by a further 0.7% the following month, according to figures published by the Commerce Department.

US industrial shipments were down 0.5% month-on-month. With inventories virtually unchanged (-0.1%), the inventory-to-delivery ratio rose very slightly to 1.49 in February.

On the bond front, yields, which had climbed from +8 to +9pts, have been easing since 4.30 p.m., with OATs now only +1pt basis point (to 2.76%), and Bunds +1.5pt (to 2.256%).

Following these figures, T-Bonds eased 10 pts in a few minutes to -5 pts at 3.385%: the dollar lost ground against the euro and is now trading at $1.0950/EUR.

In other stock news, Hermès (+1.8% to $1,894) became the 3rd CAC stock to break the 200 bn€ capi barrier, behind the untouchable LVMH (445 bn€) and L'Oréal (224 bn€), which announced the signature of an agreement with Natura &Co for the acquisition of Aesop, an Australian luxury cosmetics brand, valuing the latter at $2.52 bn in enterprise value.

Sanofi reports the publication of results from two Phase III studies on fitusiran in The Lancet and The Lancet Haematology, which 'demonstrate its potential to address the medical needs of all hemophilia patients'.

Stellantis has announced a new organization for the financing and leasing of its services in Europe. This new organization will simplify and strengthen its multi-brand capability with the new financial services of Stellantis (formerly Banque PSA Finance) and Leasys (consolidation of the activities of the Leasys and Free2move Lease branches).

Finally, Société du Grand Paris has awarded the Colas Rail / Alstom consortium the contract for Batch 2 of Line 17 of the Grand Paris Express. With a length of 26.5 km, line 17 will span 13 communes and link 9 stations between Saint-Denis Pleyel and Le Mesnil-Amelot.

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