European stocks were under pressure on Friday and facing their biggest weekly loss since late 2020, as investors nervously watched the intensifying war in Ukraine, which resulted in a fire at the region’s biggest power plant.
The Stoxx Europe 600 index fell 2.5% to 426.37, and has lost more than 5% since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began more than a week ago. The index is facing a weekly decline of 5.1%, which would be the biggest such loss since October 2020 if it holds. According to Associated Press reports, the nuclear power plant in the southern Ukrainian city of Enerhodar had been shelled by Russian troops, sparking a fire at the facility. The plant reportedly has six reactors, and three had been offline before the attack.
“We stick to our guns and we repeat for the umpteenth time that it is too early to assume that the worst is over. Even following the aforementioned agreement, Russian forces continued surrounding and bombarding Ukrainian cities, with the conflict entering its second week,” said Pissouros. Nearly every sector in Europe was in the red, with heavily weighted energy names such as Shell SHEL SHEL , TotalEnergies TTE TTE and BP BP BP , along with banking giant HSBC HSBC HSBA all down by 3% each. That’s as oil prices remained elevated Friday.