Europe's banking sector got hammered on Monday
European stocks opened the week in negative territory, dragged lower by a stuttering banking sector on Monday as investors got their first chance to react to Friday's Europe-wide bank stress tests.
Stocks across the board fell on the day, but banks were by far the worst hit, with the STOXX European bank index dropping by 2.46% at the close.
The worst hit single banking institution on the day was Italy's largest lender, UniCredit. UniCredit fell more than 9% after Friday's stress test showed a weaker than expected result. Here's how the bank looked on the day:
In the UK's banking sector things were a little better stocks wise, and all but one major lender in the UK lost value on the day. Here's the scoreboard:
- Royal Bank of Scotland - down 1.61%
- Barclays - down 2.07%
- HSBC - down 1.08%
- Lloyds - up 0.17%
The only major European banking stock to see a substantial rise on Monday was stricken Italian lender Monte dei Paschi di Siena. At one point in the day Monte dei Paschi was up by more than 8.8%, and though it fell to the close, still finished the day higher by around 3.3%.
Monte dei Paschi's rise on the day was largely fuelled by the last minute rescue deal agreed by the bank on Friday afternoon, which went some way to assuaging fears from investors that Monte dei Paschi is on the brink of collapse. Here's the chart on the day:
As a result of weak banking stocks, shares across the continent fell. Here's the Europe-wide scoreboard:
