Peter Nurse 

Investing.com — European stock markets traded higher Tuesday, rebounding from the previous session’s sharp losses, as investors digest key quarterly earnings reports, particularly from the banking sector.

By 3:55 AM ET (0755 GMT), the in Germany traded 1.1% higher, the in France rose 0.5% and the U.K.’s climbed 0.7%.

Europe’s earnings season is here in full force with the bank sector at the forefront. 

HSBC (LON:) stock fell 3.2% after Europe’s largest bank warned that further share buybacks were unlikely this year even as its pretax profit fell by less than expected in the first quarter.

UBS (SIX 🙂 Stock rose 1.3% as the Swiss bank posted the highest first-quarter net profit since 15 years. The stock rose 17% against expectations. This was despite the uncertainty surrounding the war in Ukraine. Strong trading helped to outweigh any potential loss.

Banco Santander (BME:) stock fell 0.9% despite Spain’s biggest lender reporting its net profit in the first quarter beat forecasts, although it was lower than the profit booked in the fourth quarter of 2019 before Covid-19 hit the country.

Elsewhere, Maersk (CSE:) stock surged 5.8% after the shipping group raised its outlook for the full year after first-quarter operating profit came in above its previous expectations, driven by high container freight rates.

After France’s largest telecom operator, Orange (EPA) fell 0.2% in stock after it said that its core operating profit for the first quarter was only 1%.

European equity indices were significantly lower after Monday’s close. Sentiment is fragile because of Covid-19 case spread in China. Investors are still concerned whether global economic growth can be sustained by an ever more hawkish Federal Reserve pivot.

That said, there was a late revival on Wall Street, with Twitter (NYSE:) in focus as it finally confirmed it had accepted Elon Musk’s $44 billion offer to take the social media platform private. 

This week’s important earnings release comes from tech companies, including Alphabet (NASDAQ) and Microsoft (NASDAQ). These reports will be released after Tuesday’s close.

The conflict in Ukraine continues to enter its third month. Russian forces continue to bombard the Azovstal steel factory in Mariupol in the southeast. There, some 2000 Ukrainian fighters are still fighting for their lives. 

Oil prices weakened Tuesday, adding to the sharp losses of the previous session with concerns remaining that more Covid-19 lockdowns in China will hit demand for crude from the world’s largest importer.

Futures were trading 0.8% higher at $97.80 per barrel by 3:55 PM ET. Contracts fell 0.6%, to $101.60, Both benchmarks were down around 4% Monday.

Also, the price of gold rose 0.1% at $1,896.95/oz while it traded 0.3% lower, at 1.0679.