The majority of stock markets in Western Europe are trading on a downward trend after a weak decline at the end of last week. Investors are cautious in anticipation of the publication of important macroeconomic indicators, including data on inflation in the U.S., which will be released on Wednesday, according to Trading Economics. On Friday, it became known that consumer prices in the euro zone in December soared by 5% compared to the same month a year earlier. Thus, the pace of their rise accelerated for the sixth consecutive month and reached a record.

Norway on Monday reported that inflation in the country in December reached 5.3%, which is the highest value since October 2008. This was primarily due to rising costs of housing, utilities and transportation services. Meanwhile, food and beverages continued to become cheaper, albeit at a slower pace. The Stoxx Europe 600 composite index of the region’s largest companies fell by 0.3% to 484.83 points by 12:00 Moscow time. As of 12:06 Moscow time, the German indicator DAX decreased by 0.31%, French CAC 40 – by 0.22%, Spanish IBEX 35 decreased by 0.25%, British FTSE 100 lost 0.14%. Meanwhile, the Italian FTSE MIB rose by 0.15%. Shares of the French IT company Atos SE are the leader of the fall in quotations – by 15.7%.

It expects that financial indicators for 2021 will be worse than expected. In particular, the volume of orders, according to preliminary calculations, amounted to about 10.8 billion euros, which is 2.4% lower than the figure for the previous year, excluding changes in exchange rates. This figure was expected to remain at around the 2020 level. The world’s second-largest sporting goods manufacturer Adidas AG announced that it will conduct a buyback of up to 1 billion euros in the first quarter. The price of securities of the German company decreases in the course of trading by 1.1%. Oil producer BP Plc announced that it plans to buy back its shares for up to $500 million by February 7. The cost of securities of the British company is rising by 1.1%. In addition, shares of Microsaic Systems Plc are rising 0.5%. The U.K. technology firm’s revenue continued to grow to about 900,000 pounds ($1.2 million) last year, up from 200,000 pounds in 2020.