European stocks market 8/20/2012

European stocks market 8/20/2012 : European stocks were slightly higher Monday, extending beyond recent multimonth highs for equity indexes. The U.K.'s FTSE 100 was up 0.4%, Germany's DAX was up 0.1% and France's CAC was largely unchanged.

On Friday, the benchmark Stoxx 600 index ended up 0.6% at 272.83; a 13-month closing high. Market participants say they are becoming increasingly confident that Spain will ask for financial aid soon, which in turn could spur a round of massive sovereign debt purchases by the European Central Bank.

in addition, market participants noted an article in Der Spiegel released this weekend, which stated that the ECB is considering setting interest rate thresholds for each country for the future purchase of government bonds.

The article, which doesn't name the source of the information, says under the proposal the ECB would buy the bonds of crisis-hit countries when their interest rates exceed a certain premium to German government bonds.

Already, commentators are questioning whether such a move would help ease tensions in the euro zone.


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