The CAC40 ended the session down 0.77%, at 7570 points, penalized by STMicro (-4.6%), Dassault Systèmes (-3.1%) and Sanofi (-1.9%) in the absence of US investors, on vacation this Wednesday to celebrate the abolition of slavery (or 'Juneteenth').

The holiday comes as the US equity markets posted their seventh consecutive session of gains yesterday, ending the day with new records (7 out of 7 for the Nasdaq), boosted by Nvidia, which took the title of the world's largest capitalization with a market valuation of $3,335 billion, ahead of Microsoft ($3.317 billion) and Apple (3,285 billion).

In addition to the absence of Wall Street, the European financial markets were not very lively today, due to a lack of economic indicators.

Nevertheless, the early morning was marked by the announcement of a further fall in inflation in the UK, where consumer prices rose by just 2% year-on-year in May, compared with +2.3% in April.

This is good news as market operators await the Bank of England's (BoE) monetary policy meeting on Thursday, at the end of which no rate cut is expected.

The end of the week will also be punctuated by a number of statistics, including the PMI activity indices for Europe, due out on Friday.

Amid this almost general torpor, the euro continues to hover around $1.074.

The session saw little activity on the bond front, with the spread between the OAT (+3.3Pts to 3.153%) and the German ten-year bond (+1Pt to 2.402%) widening once again.

Brent crude oil gained 0.2% to $85.5 a barrel, which was of little significance in the absence of trading on WTI (NYMEX closed on Wednesday).

In other French company news, EssilorLuxottica announced the signature of an exclusive licensing agreement with Diesel for the design, production and worldwide distribution of Diesel eyewear.

Société Générale announced on Wednesday that it had reached an agreement to sell its neobank for entrepreneurs, Shine, to Denmark's Ageras.

Finally, Eurazeo announced its investment, through its Small-mid buyout team, in Rydoo, a Belgian company whose solution enables companies to manage and control their employees' expenses and professional costs thanks to intelligent software.

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