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Major stock markets rose Friday, as a key US inflation reading met expectations and strong results from Apple reassured investors that the tech sector is still healthy after a turbulent week.AI-related stocks, particularly chip-maker Nvidia, had slumped earlier in the week after China’s DeepSeek unveiled an artificial intelligence model to rival those of US tech giants.But markets have clawed back most of those losses thanks to positive earnings and company strategy updates, and as some investors reevaluated the risks US firms face from Chinese competition. “Monday’s sell-off was likely an overreaction, as markets tend to ‘shoot first and ask questions later’,” said Daniela Sabin Hathorn, senior market analyst at Capital.com.”Big US tech stocks still maintain significant competitive advantages that will make them difficult to disrupt overnight,” she said.Financial markets also digested the latest US inflation reading.Data showed the Federal Reserve’s favourite inflation gauge, the Personal Consumption Expenditures index, accelerated for a third month in a row, reaching 2.6 percent in December as expected.”While there’s still further progress to be made on inflation, investors can breathe a sigh of relief and refocus on the market’s more notable fundamentals, like earnings growth and the economy,” said Bret Kenwell, US investment analyst at eToro trading platform.Wall Street’s three main indexes were all higher in morning trading, though the wider S&P 500 and the tech-heavy Nasdaq were still down slightly from the start of the week.Apple shares were up almost three percent after the tech titan reported the day before that its profit and revenue grew strongly, even if iPhone sales did not rise as fast as analysts’ expectations.London’s benchmark FTSE 100 hit fresh highs, helped by an almost 12-percent jump in the share price of Smiths Group after the British engineering company said it planned to simplify the business and return substantial sums to shareholders.Paris and Frankfurt also rose.Data showed German inflation unexpectedly slowed in January, the first decline in months, bolstering the case for further rate cuts by the European Central Bank.Investors, however, are also bracing for tariffs that US President Donald Trump has vowed to impose on imports from Canada and Mexico this weekend.Concerns over Trump’s trade manoeuvres pushed gold to fresh record highs above $2,800 an ounce. “The gold price is proving its haven credentials, as investors choose it to hedge fears about Trump’s tariff threats,” said Kathleen Brooks, research director at XTB, even if the actual details of the potential tariffs are unclear.The dollar rose against the British pound, euro and yen.The US currency was supported by the Fed indicating this week that it did not see a need to cut interest rates further while the country’s inflation remains elevated.The ECB cut rates on Thursday, the fifth reduction since June.Next week, the Bank of England is widely forecast to trim its main interest rate, as the UK struggles to grow its economy.The greenback weighed even more so on the Mexican peso and Canadian dollar with Trump saying he would go ahead with the threatened 25 percent tariffs on the countries pencilled in for Saturday.- Key figures around 1440 GMT -New York – Dow: UP 0.3 percent at 45,008.24 pointsNew York – S&P 500: UP 0.4 percent at 6,096.97New York – Nsdaq Composite: UP 0.8 percent at 19,842.15 London – FTSE 100: UP 0.4 percent at 8,679.00 Paris – CAC 40: UP 0.3 percent at 7,962.59Frankfurt – DAX: UP 0.2 percent at 21,766.15Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 0.2 percent at 39,572.49 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: Closed for a holidayShanghai – Composite: Closed for a holidayEuro/dollar: DOWN at $1.0373 from $1.0392 on ThursdayPound/dollar: DOWN at $1.2394 from $1.2420Dollar/yen: UP at 154.89 yen from 154.38 yen Euro/pound: UP at 83.69 pence from 83.67 pence West Texas Intermediate: FLAT at $72.73 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: FLAT at $75.87 per barrel

The global economy is bracing for impact as US President Donald Trump’s deadline to impose sweeping tariffs on the three largest US trading partners — Canada, Mexico and China — draws near.Trump said shortly after taking office that he planned to introduce 25 percent tariffs on neighbors Canada and Mexico on February 1, unless they cracked down on illegal migrants crossing the US border and the flow of deadly fentanyl.He is also eyeing an additional 10 percent duty for Chinese goods on Saturday, similarly over fentanyl.While Trump has not specified tools for the new tariffs, analysts have suggested he could tap emergency economic powers — which allow the president to regulate imports during a national emergency. But this could be hindered by lawsuits.On Thursday, he reiterated commitment to levies on all three countries, while re-upping threats of 100 percent tariffs on BRICS nations — a bloc including Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — if they create a rival to the US dollar.Fentanyl, many times more powerful than heroin, has been responsible for tens of thousands of overdose deaths a year.Beijing has rebuffed claims of its complicity in the deadly trade, while Canada has countered that below one percent of undocumented migrants and fentanyl entering the United States comes through its northern border.JPMorgan analysts believe tariffs are “a bargaining chip” to accelerate the renegotiation of a trade deal between the United States, Mexico and Canada.”However, potentially dismantling a decades-long free-trade area could be a significant shock,” said a recent JPMorgan note.One lesson from Trump’s first term was that policy changes could be announced or threatened on short notice, it added.Tariffs are paid by US businesses to the government on purchases from abroad and the economic weight can fall on importers, foreign suppliers or consumers.Another looming deadline is April 1, by which Trump has called for reviews including on trade deficits.- Recession risk -Wendong Zhang, an assistant professor at Cornell University, said Canada and Mexico would suffer the most under 25 percent US tariffs and with proportional retaliations.”Canada and Mexico stand to lose 3.6 percent and two percent of real GDP respectively, while the US would suffer a 0.3 percent real GDP loss,” he added.Blanket US tariffs and Ottawa’s response in kind could cause Canada to fall into a recession this year, Tony Stillo of Oxford Economics told AFP, adding that the United States also risks a shallow downturn.Mexico could face a similar situation, Tim Hunter of Oxford Economics added.It is unclear if there could be exceptions. Trump said he expected to decide Thursday whether to include crude oil imports in the new levies.Canada and Mexico supplied more than 70 percent of US crude oil imports, said a Congressional Research Service report.Stillo noted that heavy oil is “exported by Canada, refined in the US, and there aren’t easy substitutes for that in the US.”US merchandise imports from both countries largely enter duty free or with very low rates on average, said the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE).A tariff hike would shock both industrial buyers and consumers, cutting across everything from machinery to fruits, PIIE added.Canadian officials said Ottawa would provide pandemic-level financial support to workers and businesses if US tariffs hit, vowing their readiness to respond.Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said she was confident her country could avoid the levy.But Trump’s commerce secretary nominee Howard Lutnick said Wednesday “there will be no tariff” if Canada and Mexico acted on immigration and fentanyl.- ‘Grand bargain’ -Trump is also mulling more tariffs on Chinese goods.White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told reporters this week: “The president has said that he is very much still considering that for February 1st.”Beijing has vowed to defend its “national interests,” and a foreign ministry spokeswoman previously warned that “there are no winners in a trade war.”On the election campaign trail, Trump raised the idea of levies of 60 percent or higher on Chinese imports.Isaac Boltansky of financial services firm BTIG expects “incremental tariff increases” on Chinese goods, with consumer goods likely to face lower hikes.”Our sense is that Trump will vacillate between carrots and sticks with China, with the ultimate goal being some sort of grand bargain before the end of his term,” he said in a recent note.

Data watchdogs in South Korea and Ireland said Friday they would ask Chinese AI startup DeepSeek to clarify how it manages users’ personal information, as governments from around the world turned a spotlight on the service.DeepSeek launched its R1 chatbot this month, claiming it matches the capacity of artificial intelligence pace-setters in the United States for a fraction of the investment.The news sparked a rout in tech titans — Nvidia dived 17 percent Monday — and raised questions about the hundreds of billions of dollars invested in AI in recent years.But countries now including South Korea, Ireland, France, Australia and Italy have questions about DeepSeek’s data practices.”We intend to submit our request in writing as early as Friday to obtain information about how DeepSeek handles personal data,” an official from South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission told AFP, without giving further details.Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) told AFP it was “requesting information on the data processing conducted in relation to data subjects in Ireland” from DeepSeek.The DPC is a lead European tech watchdog, as many major firms have their EU headquarters in Ireland due to Dublin’s generous tax incentives.-‘Be very careful’-Earlier this week Italy launched an investigation into the R1 model and blocked it from processing Italian users’ data.The Italian Data Protection Agency is asking what information is used to train DeepSeek’s AI system and, if the data is scraped from the internet, how users are informed about the processing of their data.French watchdog CNIL also said it would question DeepSeek about its chatbot “to better understand the way it works and the risks regarding data protection”.Australia’s science minister Ed Husic has also raised privacy concerns over the company’s AI service and urged users to think carefully before downloading it.”There are a lot of questions that will need to be answered in time on quality, consumer preferences, data and privacy management,” Husic told national broadcaster ABC.”I would be very careful about that. These type of issues need to be weighed up carefully,” he added.The Italian watchdog in December fined OpenAI 15 million euros ($15.6 million) over the use of personal data by its popular ChatGPT chatbot, but the US tech firm said it would appeal.Italy also temporarily blocked ChatGPT over privacy concerns in March 2023, becoming the first Western country to take such action.DeepSeek has said it used less-advanced H800 chips — permitted for sale to China until 2023 under US export controls — to power its large learning model.South Korean chip giants Samsung Electronics and SK hynix are key suppliers of advanced chips used in AI servers.Worries about the impact of DeepSeek battered stocks in Seoul as the market reopened after an extended break Friday.Samsung fell more than two percent, while SK hynix plunged almost 12 percent at one point.But several industry leaders have welcomed DeepSeek’s arrival and the injection of competition, while analysts have flagged the benefits of the shake-up.

European and Asian stock markets mostly rose Friday, the end of a week beset by volatility after China’s DeepSeek unveiled an artificial intelligence model to rival those of US tech giants.Confirmation from US President Donald Trump that the world’s biggest economy would impose hefty tariffs on Canada and Mexico from this weekend added to the economic unrest felt around the globe, pushing haven investment gold to fresh record highs Thursday.Following sharp losses for equities early in the week as tech stocks plunged, markets have recovered somewhat thanks to positive earnings and company strategy updates.London’s benchmark FTSE 100 hit fresh highs Friday, helped by an 11-percent jump in the share price of Smiths Group after the British engineering company said it planned to simplify the business and return substantial sums to shareholders.The British index also took “cues from solid trading on Wall Street as the recovery from Monday’s DeepSeek related volatility continued”, noted Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.US equity indices closed higher Thursday shortly before Apple reported that sales growth fell shy of expectations in the final quarter of last year.Focus later Friday turns to a fresh inflation reading from the United States.”There’s one more hurdle to get over this week as core PCE inflation data is released in the US,” said Mould. “This metric is a big factor in informing the decision-making of the Fed (on interest rates) so a surprise in either direction could make markets increasingly febrile again.”The US Federal Reserve kept borrowing costs unchanged this week, in contrast to the European Central Bank which Thursday cut rates as growth stalls in the eurozone.Next week the Bank of England is widely forecast to trim its main interest rate, as the UK struggles to grow its economy.The dollar rose Friday, including against the British pound, euro and yen.The greenback weighed more so on the Mexican peso and Canadian dollar, however, after Trump said he would go ahead with the threatened 25 percent tariffs on the countries pencilled in for Saturday.The US currency has been supported this week also by the Fed indicating that it did not see a need to cut interest rates further while the country’s inflation remaining elevated.- Key figures around 0945 GMT -London – FTSE 100: UP 0.4 percent at 8,685.05 pointsParis – CAC 40: UP 0.4 percent at 7,974.67Frankfurt – DAX: UP 0.2 percent at 21,777.48Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 0.2 percent at 39,572.49 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: Closed for a holidayShanghai – Composite: Closed for a holidayNew York – Dow: UP 0.4 percent at 44,882.13 (close)Euro/dollar: DOWN at $1.0377 from $1.0392 on ThursdayPound/dollar: DOWN at $1.2416 from $1.2420Dollar/yen: UP at 154.65 yen from 154.38 yen Euro/pound: DOWN at 83.58 pence from 83.67 pence West Texas Intermediate: DOWN 0.2 percent at $72.58 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: DOWN 0.3 percent at $75.64 per barrelburs-bcp/lth

The operating profit of South Korean tech giant Samsung Electronics sank almost a third in the fourth quarter owing to spending on research, the company said Friday, as analysts said it was struggling to meet demand for chips used in AI servers.The news comes as industry leaders try to assess the outlook for the sector after Chinese startup DeepSeek unveiled a groundbreaking chatbot that performed as well as artificial intelligence pacesetters — apparently for a fraction of the cost.The world’s largest memory-chip maker had already acknowledged in October that it was facing a “crisis”, and acknowledged questions had arisen about its “fundamental technological competitiveness and the future of the company”.It said operating profit fell to 6.5 trillion won ($4.5 billion) in October-December, from 9.18 trillion won in the previous three months. However, it was up 130 percent on-year.Sales rose 11.8 percent to 75.78 trillion won and net profit rose 22.2 percent to 7.75 trillion won on-year, topping forecasts according to Yonhap News Agency. The firm said the fourth-quarter fall-off was down to “soft market conditions especially for IT products, and an increase in expenditures including R&D”, as well as the “initial ramp-up costs to secure production capacity for cutting-edge nodes”.It warned that in the first three months of 2025 “overall earnings improvement may be limited due to weakness in the semiconductors business”.US titan Nvidia, whose semiconductors power the AI industry, has been relying on SK hynix as its main supplier of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips for its AI graphics processing units (GPU).But Samsung, the world’s largest memory chip maker, has been struggling to meet the US firm’s requirements.Gloria Tsuen, a Moody’s Ratings vice president and senior credit officer, told AFP that its technology leadership “in the semiconductor market has been eroded over the last few years”.”The rapidly increasing demand for AI chips also heightens the technological difficulty in developing new, custom-made chips for customers in a timely manner,” she added.Neil Shah of Counterpoint Research said Samsung’s “conservative” moves to focus on costs relative to more challenging customer demands had been “key factors for the headwinds”.Still, Bloomberg reported Friday that Samsung had obtained approval to supply a “version of its fifth-generation high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips” to Nvidia, citing people familiar with the matter. Samsung declined to comment when asked by AFP about the report.- Blessing in disguise? – The earnings figures come as the tech world is shaken by news of DeepSeek new R1 chatbot, which sparked a rout in tech titans — Nvidia dived 17 percent Monday — and raised questions about the hundreds of billions of dollars invested in AI in recent years.The Chinese startup has said it used less-advanced H800 chips — permitted for export to China until late 2023 — to power its large learning model.Worries about the impact of DeepSeek battered stocks in Seoul as the market reopened after an extended break Friday.Samsung ended down more than two percent, while SK hynix lost 9.9 percent, having earlier plunged almost 12 percent. Jaejune Kim, executive vice president of Samsung’s memory business, said in an earnings call that the company was “monitoring industry trends considering various scenarios”, as it also supplies HBM chips used in GPUs to various clients.”While it is premature to make judgements based on the currently limited information, we anticipate that long-term opportunities and short-term risks will coexist in the market,” he said.He added that Samsung was determined to “actively respond to the rapidly evolving AI market”.While Samsung faces fundamental technology headwinds, DeepSeek’s claims have “challenged the fundamental economics and investments for ongoing AI waves”, said Counterpoint’s Shah.”This ‘frugal innovation’ could potentially slow down or stretch the hundreds of billions of dollars in AI infrastructure investments over the years,” he said.”So, this could be a ‘blessing in disguise’ for Samsung, allowing them to take the time needed to perfect their solution or to lower costs,” he added.

Most Asian markets edged up Friday at the end of a week beset by volatility after China’s DeepSeek unveiled a groundbreaking chatbot, while sentiment was dampened by US President Donald Trump confirming hefty tariffs on Canada and Mexico.Traders were rattled by news that the Chinese startup had created a programme that apparently matched the capacity of US artificial intelligence pacesetters for a fraction of the investments made by American companies.The development raised questions about the vast sums of cash invested in the sector by the world’s leading companies and has fuelled fears of a retreat from some of the world’s leading firms — Nvidia tanked almost 17 percent Monday and has struggled to fully recover since.A mixed bag of results from tech giants including Microsoft and Meta in recent days have been unable to instill much excitement, though there was some cheer from Apple’s announcement Thursday of a $124.3 billion fourth-quarter profit.Several industry leaders have welcomed DeepSeek’s arrival and the injection of competition, while analysts have flagged the benefits of the shake-up.”This is the same path the PC revolution followed, with computing power becoming cheap enough that millions of individuals could use it at an affordable cost,” said Morningstar’s Eric Compton.”We believe a future where AI was both prohibitively expensive and also ‘taking over the world’ was not likely. As such, we view the advancements made by DeepSeek as promising and healthy for the overall ecosystem.”- Gold record -Still, after this week’s sell-off in Japanese chipmakers that had benefitted from the AI-rally in recent years, South Korean firms took a hit as Seoul fell on the day it reopened after a holiday.SK hynix tumbled nearly 12 percent at one point before finished only slightly better, while Samsung shed more than two percent — with the latter also reporting a drop in operating profits in October-December as it struggled to meet demand for chips used in AI servers.However, there were gains in Tokyo, Sydney, Singapore, Wellington, Mumbai, and Jakarta. Manila and Bangkok fell.Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Taipei remained closed for the Lunar New Year break.Spot gold held just shy of the record high $2,799.65 touched Thursday owing to uncertainty about the economic outlook and Trump’s trade policies. The dollar rose, with the Mexican peso and Canadian dollar taking a lot of the heat after the president said he would go ahead with the threatened 25 percent tariffs on the countries pencilled in for Saturday.Trump has accused the two key trading partners of failing to tackle illegal immigration and drug trafficking.However, it was not clear whether oil would be included or not. The countries supplied more than 71 percent of US crude oil imports in 2023, according to a congressional report.China is another possible target, though Trump’s tone on the economic powerhouse has been less forceful than during his election campaign, when he promised levies as high as 60 percent.On taking office on January 20 he said he was considering a level of 10 percent.The yen dipped even after Bank of Japan deputy governor Ryozo Himino indicated officials would continue to lift interest rates this year and data Friday showed core consumer prices in Tokyo — a barometer for the country — climbed at their fastest pace since February. – Key figures around 0700 GMT -Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 0.2 percent at 39,572.49 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: Closed for a holidayShanghai – Composite: Closed for a holidayEuro/dollar: UP at $1.0393 from $1.0392 on ThursdayPound/dollar: UP at $1.2429 from $1.2420Dollar/yen: UP at 154.76 yen from 154.38 yen Euro/pound: DOWN at 83.65 pence from 83.67 pence West Texas Intermediate: UP 0.8 percent at $73.30 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: UP 0.5 percent at $77.28 per barrelNew York – Dow: UP 0.4 percent at 44,882.13 (close)London – FTSE 100: UP 1.0 percent at 8,646.88 (close)

Japan saw its biggest year-on-year jump in foreign workers since records began, government data showed Friday, as the country seeks to address labour shortages exacerbated by its ageing population.In October 2024, the nation’s foreign workforce stood at 2.3 million — an increase of around 254,000 people from a year earlier, labour ministry data showed.That marks the biggest jump since records began in 2008, and is the latest in a series of annual record-breaking increases.The total has jumped around threefold from a decade ago, in 2014, when the number of foreign workers stood at 788,000.Japan has the world’s second-oldest population after Monaco, according to the World Bank, and its relatively strict immigration rules mean it faces growing labour shortages.Friday’s data showed Vietnamese, Chinese and Filipinos were the top three nationalities in Japan’s foreign labour force.Among the most common jobs held by foreign workers were positions in the manufacturing, hospitality, and retail sectors.A “technical intern” programme continued to account for a sizable portion of the foreign workforce, at 20.4 percent. The state-sponsored scheme is ostensibly an attempt by Japan to give participants from countries such as China and Vietnam specialised experience to use in their home countries.But critics have long called it a “backdoor” source of foreign labour in a conservative nation loath to officially acknowledge it is open to immigrants.The intern programme has also been long dogged by allegations of discrimination and physical abuse.

European stock markets rose Thursday as the European Central Bank cut interest rates again while US shares were steady after a mixed bag of company earnings reports. European markets advanced across the board after the ECB trimmed interest rates for the fifth time since June as inflation eases and the eurozone economy stagnates.In New York, major US indices veered in and out of negative territory before finishing higher following a tidal wave of earnings from Microsoft, IBM and other big companies. Meanwhile, gold hit a new record on uncertainty about the economic and trade policies of President Donald Trump. The ECB move followed the Federal Reserve’s decision to keep US borrowing costs on hold Wednesday as the outlook for inflation, despite coming down, remains more elevated in the United States.Data showed that the eurozone economy was flat in the fourth-quarter with France and Germany contracting slightly, Italy unchanged, and only Spain showing healthy growth among the bloc’s largest economies.By contrast, the US economy grew at an annual rate of 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department reported, in line with the consensus forecast.Even so, that report disappointed some investors because the growth rate was below expectations, stalling a recent dollar rally.”There are positives to glean about the US economic landscape,” said Bret Kenwell, an analyst at eToro. “The economy continues to grow, while the labor market remains on solid footing.”The ECB cut its rate by a quarter point to 2.75 percent while the Fed kept its benchmark lending rate at between 4.25 percent and 4.50 percent.”There is really no reason to think the ECB won’t continue to cut rates, at least to a neutral level, and we think quite probably below neutral by year-end,” said Deutsche Bank’s European economist Mark Wall. While the ECB is set to keep cutting rates, Fed chairman Jerome Powell said Wednesday that the US central bank was in no “hurry” to adjust its borrowing costs again.Trump, who last week called for rates to “drop immediately”, accused policymakers of failing “to stop the problem they created with inflation”.Powell refused to comment on the US leader’s criticism of the Fed but said decision-makers would “wait and see” how Trump’s plans to impose tariffs, and cut taxes, regulations and immigration would affect the economy.- Eyes on companies -Traders also focused on a slew of corporate earnings.Facebook parent Meta on Wednesday reported surging profits for 2024 and announced ambitious plans to expand its artificial intelligence infrastructure in the year ahead. Its shares were up almost two percent.Elon Musk’s electric car firm Tesla reported lower-than-expected profits but confirmed key 2025 benchmarks. Its shares climbed nearly three percent.IBM was up almost 13 percent, also on positive guidance. Microsoft reported large profits, but its shares slid more than six percent on worries over its vital cloud computing business.Among other companies in the news, American Airlines dropped 2.5 percent as investigators began probing the causes of a crash involving an affiliate carrier of American Airlines and a military helicopter that claimed 67 lives.- Key figures around 2130 GMT -New York – Dow: UP 0.4 percent at 44,882.13 (close)New York – S&P 500: UP 0.5 percent at 6,071.17 (close) New York – Nasdaq Composite: UP 0.3 percent at 19,681.75 (close)London – FTSE 100: UP 1.0 percent at 8,646.88 (close)Paris – CAC 40: UP 0.9 percent at 7,941.64 (close)Frankfurt – DAX: UP 0.4 percent at 21,727.20 (close)Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 0.3 percent at 39,513.97 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: Closed for a holidayShanghai – Composite: Closed for a holidayEuro/dollar: DOWN at $1.0392 from $1.0421 Pound/dollar: DOWN at $1.2420 from $1.2452 WednesdayDollar/yen: DOWN at 154.38 yen from 155.22 yen Euro/pound: DOWN at 83.67 pence from 83.68 pence West Texas Intermediate: UP 0.2 percent at $72.73 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: UP 0.4 percent at $76.87 per barrel

US and European stock markets rose Thursday as the European Central Bank cut interest rates again and companies posted healthy earnings.European markets advanced across the board and the euro held steady after the ECB trimmed interest rates for the fifth time since June as inflation eases and the eurozone economy stagnates.In New York, the wider S&P 500 index and the tech-heavy Nasdaq rose, but the Dow was little changed.The ECB move followed the Federal Reserve’s decision to keep US borrowing costs on hold Wednesday as the outlook for inflation, despite coming down, remains more elevated in the United States.Data showed the eurozone economy was flat in the fourth-quarter with France and Germany contracting slightly, Italy unchanged, and only Spain showing healthy growth among the bloc’s largest economies.By contrast, the US economy grew at an annual rate of 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department reported, in line with the consensus forecast.”There are positives to glean about the US economic landscape,” said Bret Kenwell, an analyst at eToro. “The economy continues to grow, while the labor market remains on solid footing.”The ECB cut its rate by a quarter point to 2.75 percent while the Fed kept its benchmark lending rate at between 4.25 percent and 4.50 percent.”There is really no reason to think the ECB won’t continue to cut rates, at least to a neutral level, and we think quite probably below neutral by year-end,” said Deutsche Bank’s European economist Mark Wall. While the ECB is set to keep cutting rates, Fed chairman Jerome Powell said Wednesday the US central bank was in no “hurry” to adjust its borrowing costs again.US President Donald Trump, who last week called for rates to “drop immediately”, accused policymakers of failing “to stop the problem they created with inflation”.Powell refused to comment on the US leader’s criticism of the Fed but said decision-makers would “wait and see” how Trump’s plans to impose tariffs, and cut taxes, regulations and immigration would affect the economy.- Eyes on companies -Traders were also focusing on a slew of corporate earnings.Facebook parent Meta on Wednesday reported surging profits for 2024, and announced ambitious plans to expand its artificial intelligence infrastructure in the year ahead. Its shares were up almost three percent.Elon Musk’s electric car firm Tesla reported lower-than-expected profits but confirmed key 2025 benchmarks. Its shares rose almost five percent. IBM was up nine percent, also on positive guidance. Microsoft reported large profits, but its shares slid six percent on worries over its vital cloud computing business.Apple is expected to report strong results after the market closes. Earlier, Asian stock markets closed mixed in holiday-thinned trading.- Key figures around 1440 GMT -New York – Dow: UP LESS THAN 0.1 percent at 44,723.36 pointsNew York – S&P 500: UP 0.3 percent at 6,056.11  New York – Nasdaq Composite: UP 0.2 percent at 19,674.05 London – FTSE 100: UP 0.6 percent at 8,613.32 Paris – CAC 40: UP 0.7 percent at 7,925.51Frankfurt – DAX: UP 0.2 percent at 21,666.81Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 0.3 percent at 39,513.97 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: Closed for a holidayShanghai – Composite: Closed for a holidayEuro/dollar: UP at $1.0434 from $1.0425 on WednesdayPound/dollar: UP at $1.2466 from $1.2444Dollar/yen: DOWN at 154.20 yen from 155.15 yen Euro/pound: DOWN at 83.70 pence from 83.68 pence West Texas Intermediate: DOWN 0.4 percent at $72.35 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: DOWN 0.3 percent at $76.36 per barrel

European stock markets rose and the euro dipped Thursday, with the European Central Bank expected to cut interest rates as inflation eases and the eurozone economy stalls.The ECB announcement will follow the Federal Reserve’s decision to keep US borrowing costs on hold Wednesday as inflation, despite coming down, remains elevated in the United States.Asian stock markets closed mixed in more holiday-thinned trading, with investors digesting broadly positive earnings from tech giants that came days after their valuations tumbled as Chinese firm DeepSeek took the global AI scene by storm.The tepid performance in Asia followed a retreat on Wall Street but the volatility that greeted the start of the week disappeared.Wednesday saw a broadly upbeat readout, with Facebook-parent Meta, IBM and Tesla posting healthy earnings, though Microsoft disappointed. Apple is due to report Thursday.With the ECB seen certain to cut eurozone interest rates, focus will be on president Christine Lagarde’s press conference.Ahead of the central bank’s announcement, official data showed the eurozone economy stalled in the last three months of 2024, performing worse than expected as top economies Germany and France contracted.Analysts at Bloomberg and FactSet had forecast the single-currency area’s economy to grow by 0.1 percent compared to the previous quarter.Germany’s economy retreated by 0.2 percent while French output shrank 0.1 percent, both worse than forecast, with both countries mired by political turmoil.Kathleen Brooks, research director at XTB trading group, said US President Donald Trump’s tariffs were also “the key threat for the eurozone economy right now”. “Although Trump has spoken out about universal tariffs and has signaled that he is not happy with the eurozone’s trade surplus with the US, he has not specifically mentioned tariffs for the currency bloc, unlike Mexico and Canada”.- Fed holds -While the ECB is set to cut rates, the Fed chairman Jerome Powell said the US central bank was in no “hurry” to adjust its borrowing costs again.Trump — who last week revived his criticism of the Fed and Powell and called for rates to “drop immediately” — accused policymakers of failing “to stop the problem they created with inflation”.Powell said it was “not appropriate” for him to respond to the comments, adding that decision-makers would “wait and see” how Trump’s plans to impose tariffs, and cut taxes, regulations and immigration would affect the economy.- Key figures around 0930 GMT -London – FTSE 100: UP 0.2 percent at 8,576.74 pointsParis – CAC 40: UP 0.5 percent at 7,908.61Frankfurt – DAX: UP 0.3 percent at 21,696.53Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 0.3 percent at 39,513.97 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: Closed for a holidayShanghai – Composite: Closed for a holidayNew York – Dow: DOWN 0.3 percent at 44,713.52 (close)Euro/dollar: DOWN at $1.0410 from $1.0425 on WednesdayPound/dollar: UP at $1.2449 from $1.2444Dollar/yen: DOWN at 154.40 yen from 155.15 yen Euro/pound: DOWN at 83.62 pence from 83.68 pence West Texas Intermediate: DOWN 0.5 percent at $72.29 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: DOWN 0.5 percent at $75.25 per barrelburs-bcp/lth