Europe Stocks Little Changed as Energy Shares Rally, Autos Fall

(Bloomberg) -- European stocks ended the session little changed as miners and oil companies climbed, offsetting a slump in auto-related shares.

The Stoxx Europe 600 Index rose less than 0.1 percent at the close. Stocks advanced as much as 0.4 percent earlier in the day after a private report on hiring showed a surge in U.S. payrolls last month. The benchmark is still up for the sixth time in seven trading days, having completed its third straight quarterly gain last week. Miners on Wednesday advanced for a second day as copper prices climbed, while energy shares tracked an advance in oil.

• “Further gains for oil have served to buoy and further boost sentiment,” Mike van Dulken and Henry Croft, analysts at Accendo Markets, wrote in a note. “In focus today will be the Fed's March meeting minutes, with investors looking out for clues about the likely path of U.S. monetary policy normalization and further rate hikes this year.”
• While the Federal Reserve in March raised rates while maintaining forecasts for future increases this year, some officials since then have been hawkish. Before the meeting's minutes are released later today, traders are pricing in a 67 percent chance of an interest-rate increase by June, Fed fund futures show.
• Among shares active on corporate news, John Wood Group Plc climbed 2.7 percent after raising its estimate on cost synergies from its merger with Amec Foster Wheeler Plc. The latter's shares rose 2.3 percent.
• Carmakers were the worst performers in the Stoxx 600, completing their biggest three-day slide since January.

--With assistance from Elena Popina

To contact the reporter on this story: Namitha Jagadeesh in London at njagadeesh@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Celeste Perri at cperri@bloomberg.net, Todd White, Richard Richtmyer