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| - Europe's major stock markets rose Thursday as investors looked beyond grim economic news to focus on easing coronavirus lockdown measures, but London gains were capped after the Bank of England held interest rates and stimulus, dealers said. Asian stock markets closed mixed, while oil prices rallied. "Continued optimism about the easing of lockdowns has boosted European stock markets," said CMC Markets analyst David Madden. "A number of countries have taken steps to reopen sections of their economies and there is speculation the UK could be loosening restrictions in the next few days." With countries from Asia-Pacific to Europe and US states reopening their shattered economies, global equities have enjoyed a strong revival after crashing in March, with oil also getting much-needed support from hopes for a pick-up in demand. Nevertheless, a slew of monumentally bad data has highlighted the struggle governments face is reigniting economies, with hundreds of millions of people left jobless and countless companies going under or on the brink. In Europe, the economic devastation from the deadly COVID-19 pandemic was brought into sharper focus, with grim data showing major slumps in German and French industrial output and the British economy forecast to slump. Governments around the world are under immense pressure to ease the economic pain caused by measures to stop the virus, which has claimed at least 260,000 lives, left half of humanity under some form of lockdown and made millions jobless. London stocks added 0.7 percent in midday deals, as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was Sunday set to flag an easing in the nation's lockdown -- and despite a grim outlook from the British central bank. UK output is to crash by 14 percent this year on the coronavirus, the Bank of England forecast Thursday as it left its interest rate at a record-low 0.1 percent and opted also against fresh stimulus cash. Following the COVID-19 outbreak, the BoE had slashed its main interest rate to 0.1 percent and decided to pump £200 billion ($244 billion, 226 billion euros) into the UK economy to get retail banks lending to fragile businesses. "The decision not to expand bond-buying with more printed money gave the pound a small uplift" in trading Thursday, noted Jasper Lawler, head of research at London Capital Group. The strong pound capped equity gains because it weighs on share prices of London-listed multinationals whose earnings are in other units. The BoE's latest forecast, meanwhile, came a day after the European Union warned of a 7.7-percent eurozone contraction in 2020. And industrial production in Germany fell by 9.2 percent month-on-month in March, the worst fall since the manufacturing output data series was started in 1991. Yet investors brushed off the poor newsflow with Frankfurt and Paris stocks adding 0.9 percent apiece. In Asia however, equities dropped as the economic reality of the coronavirus crisis became even starker, and as China-US relations soured. Investors are increasingly worried about simmering tensions between China and the United States after Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo hit out at Beijing's handling of the pandemic, accusing it of a COVID-19 cover-up. London - FTSE 100: UP 0.7 percent at 5,892.93 points Frankfurt - DAX 30: UP 0.9 percent at 10,705.40 Paris - CAC 40: UP 0.9 percent at 4,471.75 Milan - FTSE MIB: UP 0.7 percent at 17,284.28 Madrid - IBEX 35: UP 0.2 percent at 6,683.70 EURO STOXX 50: UP 0.8 percent at 2,866.15 Tokyo - Nikkei 225: UP 0.3 percent at 19,674.77 (close) Hong Kong - Hang Seng: DOWN 0.7 percent at 23,908.63 (close) Shanghai - Composite: DOWN 0.2 percent at 2,871.52 (close) New York - Dow: DOWN 0.9 percent at 23,664.64 (close) Brent North Sea crude: UP 4.6 percent at $31.09 per barrel West Texas Intermediate: UP 6.3 percent at $25.51 per barrel Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0799 from $1.0795 at 2100 GMT Dollar/yen: UP at 106.39 yen from 106.12 Pound/dollar: UP at $1.2365 from $1.2350 Euro/pound: DOWN at 87.33 pence from 87.41 pence dan-rfj/bcp/jh
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