Wall Street is expected to be mixed, and European stock markets are moving without a clear direction at mid-session on Friday, as they await monthly US employment figures, which are sure to fuel debate on the Federal Reserve's monetary policy. Futures reported a 0.14% gain for the Dow Jones, a stable opening (-0.01%) for the Standard & Poor's-500 and a 0.3% decline for the Nasdaq. In Paris, the CAC 40 gained 0.28% to 6,780.72 around 12:10 GMT. In Frankfurt, the Dax gave up 0.06%, while in London, the FTSE gained 0.25%.

The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index was up by 0.13%, the Eurozone EuroStoxx 50 by 0.14% and the Stoxx 600 by 0.17%.

The latter is currently up 3.5% for the week as a whole. The first estimate of inflation in the eurozone in December confirmed the deceleration recently observed in France and Germany, with the HICP index showing a year-on-year rise of 9.2%, after 10.1% in November.

However, this trend can be attributed solely to the decline in energy prices. Excluding this category and unprocessed food, inflation accelerated to 6.9%, which should encourage the European Central Bank to continue raising rates in the months ahead.

Investors' attention is now focused on the monthly US job creation figures for December, released at 13:30 GMT. The Reuters consensus is for a fall in non-farm payrolls to 200,000 and a stable unemployment rate of 3.7%. The strength of the labor market, illustrated on Thursday by several indicators, has raised fears that the Fed may raise rates at a high level for longer than expected.

"Given what we're currently seeing in the labor market, the Fed seems reluctant to slow policy, which means we could well have another rate hike of at least 100 basis points in total by the end of the first quarter," said CMC Markets. STOCKS TO WATCH ON WALL STREET

Tesla lost 4.7% in pre-market trading on Wall Street, as the automaker slashed sales prices for its electric cars in China for the second time in less than three months.

VALUES IN EUROPE

In European corporate news, Sodexo was down 2.08% despite better-than-expected first-quarter sales for fiscal 2023.

By sector, the energy sector gained 0.94% and the mining sector 1.06%, buoyed by optimism regarding China's economic recovery.

RATES Yields on US Treasuries are little changed as we await US employment statistics: the ten-year stands at 3.7216%.

The German equivalent loses almost two basis points to 2.285%. For the time being, it has lost more than 27 basis points over the week, the sharpest decline since the end of October, following inflation figures for European countries.

CURRENCIES The dollar gained ground against a basket of six currencies (+0.48%) on the prospect of further Fed monetary tightening.

The euro dropped 0.31% to below 1.05.

OIL

The oil market slipped back slightly into the red as a result of uncertainties about the global economy. Brent crude lost 0.1% to $78.61 a barrel, and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) 0.08% to $73.61.

MAIN ECONOMIC INDICATORS ON THE AGENDA FOR JANUARY 6 :

COUNTRY GMT INDICATOR PERIOD PREVIOUS CONSENSUS

USA 13:30 Non-December job creation 200,000 263,000

agricultural

- unemployment rate 3.7% 3.7%

- average hourly wage +0.4% +0.6%

- average hourly wage over +5.0% +5.1

one year

USA 15h00 ISM services December 55.0 56.5

(Laetitia Volga, edited by Blandine Hénault)

by Laetitia Volga