Europe Stocks Up As Vodafone Gains; ECB On Deck

European stocks leaned higher Thursday, with gains for Vodafone Group PLC as it moves toward closing an acquisition, as investors prepared for the European Central Bank’s policy meeting.

The Stoxx Europe 600 index rose 0.2% to 346.24, and a win Thursday would be the benchmark’s third in a row.

Perched near the top of index was Vodafone , picking up 1.3% after the European Commission cleared the telecom company’s €7.2 billion ($9.83 billion) proposed purchase of Ono, Spain’s largest cable operator.

But Balfour Beatty PLC shares shares logged the sharpest decline, down 10% after it warned of“further worsening” in the mechanical and electrical engineering part of its U.K. construction business. That unit will see a £35 million profit shortfall, the company said, but added that overall group pretax profit expectations for 2014 remain unchanged at £145 million to £160 million.

Investors on Thursday afternoon will look for to the European Central Bank for comments about euro-zone inflation and economy, after it concludes its July policy meeting. The central bank will announce its interest-rate decision at 12:45 p.m. London time, or 7:45 a.m. Eastern Time. ECB President Mario Draghi will hold a press conference at 1:30 p.m. in London, or 8:30 a.m. Eastern.

“The ECB will almost certainly leave policy unchanged after the wide-ranging set of measures introduced last month,” said analysts at RBC Capital Markets. “We expect the key message will be to expect nothing further in the near term, but that there is still ammunition if required.”

But there will be focus on possible details of targeted long-term refinancing operations, known as TLTRO, aimed at encouraging banks to increase lending to companies. “The big question is going to be how restrictive the terms are — how much ‘conditionality’ there is,” said Marshall Gittler, head of global FX strategy at IronFX Global, in a daily report.

“The more restrictive the conditions are, the less money banks will have available for other investments, such as buying bonds of the peripheral European countries (one of the main uses of the previous LTRO),” he said.

Among country indexes, the U.K.’s FTSE 100 rose 0.3% to 6,839.72 and France’s CAC 40 equity index  tacked on 0.6% to 4,469. Germany’s DAX 30 rose 0.4% to 9,947.98.

Investors will also monitor the key U.S. jobs report for June, with the release due Thursday instead of Friday because of the July 4th Independence Day holiday.

Source : Marketwatch