The pan-European Stoxx 600 was up 0.2% by late morning, having pared earlier gains of 0.7%. Financial services gained 2.2% while healthcare stocks fell 1.7%. Europe’s blue chip index closed 2.8 percent higher on Thursday after the release of a U.S. consumer price index sent major state averages to their biggest one-day rallies since 2020. Markets hope the data could encourage the US Federal Reserve to ease its aggressive monetary policy tightening. U.S. stock futures rose early on Friday, pointing to further gains on Wall Street, with investors also eyeing strong results from the U.S. midterm elections. Investor optimism was boosted on Friday after China announced it would ease some Covid measures, sending Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index jumping more than 7% overnight.
