- Ireland and Portugal may receive more time to return aid
- Some countries´ deficit targets may be eased
- Periphery bond yields back off
- Banks deposited 142.1bn euros overnight at ECB

FTSE-100: 0.80%
Dax-30: 1.55%
Cac-40: 1.43%
FTSE Mibtel 30: 1.92%
Ibex 35: 1.26%
Stoxx 600: 1.28%

Stocks have begun the day clearly higher buoyed, in part, by Wall Street´s performance overnight. The impetus for gains this morning, however, is not wholly American-made this time around, quite the opposite.

Following last night´s meeting of European Union finance ministers the bloc´s Economics Affairs Commisioner, Olli Rehn, signaled that several countries may be given more time to meet their budget deficit reduction goals.

As well, countries such as Ireland and Portugal may be granted greater breathing room to return the funds borrowed from international creditors - at the height of the financial crisis - in order to prop up their economies.

In short, Europe seems headed towards a degree of fiscal stimulus or, perhaps more correctly, less fiscal austerity.

Acting as a backdrop, overnight authorities in Beijing announced an increase in this year´s fiscal deficit target, which is now projected to pass from -1.5% to -2.0%.

Financial sector in focus

Deutsche Post has unveiled fourth-quarter net income amounting to €542m, far more than analysts had expected, although its guidance for 2013 was a tad less than expected.

Spanish banks will be in focus after Spain was forced to halt its auction of nationalised lender Catalunya Banc for a second time, due to the lowerthan desired bids.

Italy's Banco Popolare has warned investors to expect a much larger full-year loss than they had penciled in.

From a sector stand-point the best performance on the DJ Stoxx 600 is now to be seen in the following industrial groups: Automobiles (2.75%), Basic resources (1.92%) and Insurance (1.81%).

Eurozone service sector stronger than expected, but weakens in Spain

The Eurozone service sector purchasing managers´ index for the month of February recovered to the 47.9 point level after a reading of 47.3 for the month before (Consensus: 47.3).

All of the national gauges either beat or met economists´ expectations, save for Spain, where activity weakened in that sector last month.

Single currency bounces

The euro/dollar is now bouncing back, rising by 0.26%, to the 1.3060 dollar mark.

Front month Brent crude futures are now gaining by 0.578 dollars to the 110.73 dollar per barrel level on the ICE.

AB

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