Europe stocks head for mixed open ahead of central bank meetings; Standard Chartered announces $1.5 billion buyback

Jenni Reid

LONDON — European markets are set to see a mixed start to Tuesday, as earnings continue to dominate stock action and investors brace for U.K. and U.S. central bank decisions.

The U.K.’s FTSE 100 index is seen slipping just below the flatline, according to IG data, while France’s CAC 40 and Germany’s DAX rise just 8 and 21 points, respectively.

U.K. bank Standard Chartered announced its biggest-ever share buyback, of $1.5 billion, as it raised its outlook in half-year results.

Oil major BP hiked its dividend as it beat second-quarter earnings estimates.

Attention is also on the Federal Reserve’s July meeting which wraps up Wednesday, with market pricing indicating this could be the last Fed hold before the central bank starts cutting interest rates. Investors will be closely monitoring the language used in Fed communications after the revision in June of its forward-looking “dot plot” to just one cut this year.

That will be followed by the Bank of England’s monetary policy meeting on Thursday. The decision on whether to bring rates lower or keep them steady is seen as being on a knife-edge, despite U.K. inflation coming in at the BOE’s 2% target for the last two months.

Asia-Pacific markets were mostly lower Tuesday as the Bank of Japan commenced its meeting.

U.S. stocks were lower overnight ahead of earnings from the likes of Merck, Pfizer, PayPal, Procter & Gamble and JetBlue.

Source : cnbc