CAC 40 Slides After Hawkish Shift At Fed; Banks Hit Hard

(RTTNews) - French stocks fell notably on Thursday after the U.S. Federal Reserve cut interest rates, as expected, but warned that rate cuts may not come so easily in 2025 as anticipated earlier.

Meanwhile, the confidence among French manufacturers held steady in December after showing some recovery trends in the previous month, monthly data from the statistical office INSEE revealed today.

The manufacturing sentiment index stood at 97 in December, the same as in November. Further, the index remained below its long-term average of 100. The expected score was 96.0.

The balances of opinion on order books have increased again, but all those relating to production have decreased, the survey said.

The benchmark CAC 40 dropped 61 points, or 0.8 percent, to 7,323 after gaining 0.3 percent on Wednesday.

Banks BNP Paribas, Credit Agricole and Societe General all fell around 1 percent.

Renault rose 1.2 percent after reports emerged that Foxconn is in talks with Nissan Motor Co.'s biggest shareholder Renault about its willingness to sell its shares in the Japanese automaker.