European stocks fell sharply on Wednesday after U.S. forces sank five Iranian tankers and Tehran responded with missile strikes on Jordan, heightening fears of a broader regional conflict.
Traders also placed bets on Thursday’s European Central Bank meeting, where a 25‑basis‑point rate hike had already been fully priced in.
The pan‑European STOXX 600 slipped 0.9 percent to 644.48 after closing marginally below its prior day’s level on Tuesday.
The German DAX declined 0.9 percent, France’s CAC 40 tumbled more than 1 percent, and the United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 fell 0.4 percent.
Energy giants BP, Shell and TotalEnergies each rose roughly one percent as Brent crude exceeded $100 a barrel, driven by renewed Gulf tensions and mounting worries about further disruption to global oil supplies.
Swiss construction‑materials leader Holcim lagged about 1 percent after committing capital to Cloud Cycle, a UK‑based startup turning ready‑mix concrete into a real‑time data‑driven system.
Zara’s parent company Inditex plummeted 3.3 percent following weaker‑than‑expected second‑quarter earnings.
France’s Vallourec slipped around 1 percent despite concluding an agreement with Saudi Arabia’s Aramco for the supply of Oil Country Tubular Goods piping.
Britain’s Victorentz rose 16 percent after it raised its full‑year pre‑tax profit outlook and installed an interim chief financial officer.
Energean moved up 3.5 percent, posting a 45 percent surge in first‑half profit.
Wealth and investment firm Aberdeen posted gains of over 2 percent after naming seasoned insurer Torbjorn Magnusson as its newly appointed chairperson.
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