The Paris Bourse lost nearly 0.5% to 0.6% shortly after the US markets opened.
The CAC40 retreated to around -0.7% (7,551) before balancing out at around 7.570 (its low of June 17 and 19), in volumes that were once again very modest (-1.2BnE).

The Euro-Stoxx50 recovered to equilibrium after a -0.2% decline to 4,906, with Frankfurt standing out with a +0.3% rise.

On Wall Street, the Nasdaq (+0.3% to 17,865) posted a 3rd consecutive session of gains, returning to its all-time highs of June 17 and 18, and ending the 1st half of the year on a high note, with a gain of almost 19%.
The S&P500 gained +0.2%, while the Dow Jones seemed to have stalled at around 39,100 and was poised to end the 2nd quarter in the red, down -2% (from 39,800 on March 28).

The session was punctuated by a number of US figures: the latest estimate for 1st quarter GDP was +1.4% (compared with +1.3%.
Durable goods orders came as a pleasant surprise, rising by +0.1% where the consensus was for -0.6%.
The Labor Department announced that 233,000 new US jobless claims were registered for the week ending June 17, down by 6,000 on the previous week, which was revised upwards from 238,000 to 239,000.

The four-week moving average - more representative of the underlying trend - came in at 236,000, up 3,000 on the previous week.

Finally, the number of people receiving regular benefits rose by 18,000 to 1,839,000.
The day is not over, however, and promises to be rich in economic and political events, with the televised debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump scheduled for this evening on CNN, with a view to the presidential election on November 5.

With less than five months to go to the polls, the polls are predicting a particularly close election (46% of voting intentions for Trump, 45% for Biden), hence the importance of this confrontation.

In France, too, candidates will be throwing their last energies into the campaign to mark the first round of early parliamentary elections, to be held on Sunday.

Beyond the upcoming composition of the National Assembly, investors remain primarily concerned by the budgetary issues of the opposing forces, which threaten to derail public accounts.

Thursday's session will also be busy on the indicators front, with durable goods orders, unemployment benefit registrations and the third estimate of first-quarter GDP due to be released in the early afternoon in the USA.

On the bond market, the 10-year yield on US government bonds, which had been little changed since the start of the week, eased slightly to 4.300% (-1.5pt) on the eve of the PCE inflation figures.

Its German equivalent stagnated at around 2.4500%, while our OATs deteriorated by +3.3pts to 3.255% (the spread rose to +80pts from 70 at the start of the week).

Brent crude is up 0.9% to $86 a barrel, while the dollar is down -0.4% against the euro (to 1.0722).

In French company news, Sanofi reports the publication in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) of the results of a positive Phase III trial of Dupixent (dupilumab) in the treatment of eosinophilic esophagitis in children aged 12 months to 11 years.

Saint-Gobain announces that it has reached a definitive agreement to acquire Fosroc, a leading unlisted global player in construction chemicals, for $1.025 billion (around €960 million) in cash.

Finally, Technip Energies and Shell Catalysts & Technologies announce a technology transfer agreement to accelerate the commercialization of Technip Energies' Bio-2-Glycols technology for the production of Mono Ethylene Glycol (MEG) from glucose.

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