MORNING BID EUROPE-Gearing up for the tech roller-coaster ride

A look at the day ahead in European and global markets from
Ankur Banerjee

Tech stocks are yet again set to sway the wider markets
after a lacklustre forecast from Facebook parent Meta Platforms
sparked a broad sell-off across regions.

Meta’s lower-than-anticipated revenue forecast along with
guidance for higher expenses knocked $200 billion of its market
value and dragged several of its rivals lower as worries over
the surging cost of AI weighed on sentiment.

Asian tech stocks followed suit and were
down 2%, with tech heavy Taiwan and South Korean stocks
both down 1%. All eyes now will be on European tech
stocks

Earnings from Intel, Alphabet and
Microsoft will probably paint a fuller picture of how
firms are faring in the AI race.

An earnings-filled Thursday awaits traders in Europe, with
banking firms in the spotlight, while yen watchers keep looking
around for a possible intervention now that the currency has
breached past the psychologically key 155 per dollar level.

Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas SA and
Barclays Plc are due to report their earnings and the
focus will be on their net interest margin especially with
interest rates in Europe and UK priced to fall in the second
half of the year.

Turkey’s central bank will not trim its policy rate from the
current 50% until the fourth quarter, a Reuters poll of
economists showed. Their policy decision is due later in the
day.

The yen has firmly breached the latest line in the sand of
155 per dollar and while the spectre of intervention from Tokyo
looms large, the lack of chatter from the Ministry of Finance
may perhaps embolden yen bears.

The Bank of Japan concludes its policy meeting on Friday and
the attention will squarely be on BOJ Governor Kazuo Ueda’s
comments and his tone. Ueda will be mindful of avoiding the
episode of 2022, when his predecessor’s dovish remarks triggered
a yen plunge that forced Tokyo to intervene, spending an
estimated $60 billion to defend the yen.

Key developments that could influence markets on Thursday:

Economic events: Turkey rate decision

Earnings: Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas SA
, Barclays PLC, AstraZeneca PLC and J
Sainsbury

Intel Corp, Microsoft, Honeywell
and Alphabet

(By Ankur Banerjee; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)