LONDON, Aug 8 - European shares fell on Thursday following stormy sessions in Asia and on Wall Street, but U.S. stocks were set to rise after data on jobless claims was stronger than expected.
Europe's continent-wide Stoxx 600 , index was last down 0.4%, after standing 0.8% lower before the data and climbing 1.5% on Wednesday. Germany's DAX index was down 0.2% and Britain's FTSE 100 , 0.7% lower. "It is difficult to read a significant message in this data," he said."At least the latest number remains on par with the previous one, without inverting the trend of rising weekly jobless claims."
Analysts said they expected markets to continue to swing in the coming days and weeks."When you have a volatility shock like this, and you have a degree of unwind in certain positions, you're very prone to sudden reversals and also a degree of uneasiness as the adjustment continues," said Erik Nelson, macro strategist at Wells Fargo. Investors are keeping a close eye on the yen in particular, which has been at the heart of the storm.
Traders on Thursday slightly reduced their bets on Federal Reserve rate cuts this year, pricing in 105 bps of cuts by December from 110 bps beforehand.