Peter Nurse 

Investing.com – European stock markets traded in a mixed fashion Thursday, helped by renewed confidence in the region’s economic recovery despite the surge of Omicron variant cases.

At 3:45 AM ET (0845 GMT), the in Germany traded 0.3% higher, the in France rose 0.1%, while the U.K.’s underperformed, dropping 0.1%. 

AstraZeneca (NASDAQ 🙂 declared Thursday that three doses of the Covid-19 vaccine are effective against Omicron coronavirus. The company cited data obtained from Oxford University.

These findings are in line with two studies published Wednesday from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, major universities of South Africa, and Imperial College London. They both suggested a lower risk of serious illness in those infected by Omicron coronavirus variants compared to Delta ones.

On Thursday, the U.K. Health Security Agency is expected to publish data about the severity of Omicron variant. 

Spain’s economic growth was a positive sign, growing by 3.4% compared to a year earlier, which is more than the initial 2.7% estimate.

Japan’s fiscal forecast for April is upgraded earlier this week. This will be the country with the fastest growth rates since fiscal 2010.

However, Thursday’s gains will be modest due to holiday investors and the Omicron variant, which can cause infections to double within 1.5-3 days according to the World Health Organization. 

For the first time, the U.K. had over 100,000 cases per day on Wednesday. The FTSE 100 was therefore underperforming Thursday. 

All travel-related stocks profited from Omicron’s news, with British Airways stock owner IAG (LON) increasing 4.8% and Jet2 (LON) stock climbing 5.2%, while Wizz Air stock rose 4.4%. Ryanair Holdings  (DE:) stock underperformed, rising only 0.4% after the company nearly doubled its forecast net loss for the current financial year due to the continental bans on British tourists announced earlier this month.

Corporate news Holcim (SIX) Stock rose 2.3% following the announcement by Malarkey Roofing Products, a Swiss building material company that it wanted to acquire residential roofing manufacturer Malarkey Roofing Products for $1.35 Billion. This deal will allow the company to enter the rapidly growing U.S. residential roof market.

Flutter Entertainment’s stock (LON:) gained 2.5% on the news that it was buying Sisal online casino operator in Italy for 1.62 billion Pounds ($2.16 Billion), in an announcement. The move comes as Flutter Entertainment looks to grow its European footprint.

Oil prices weakened slightly Thursday, giving back some of the previous session’s gains on the back of a sharp decline in stockpiles.

It was announced late Wednesday night that crude inventories had fallen 4.72 Million barrels in the last week. It is now the fourth weekly draw. This drop was larger than that reported Tuesday by the, who indicated that crude stocks had fallen by 3.67million barrels.

U.S. crude oil futures closed Wednesday at $72.39 per barrel. This was 0.5% less than the closing price of $72 on Wednesday. The contract dropped 0.5% to $74.88 

Also, the price rose 0.3% at $1,807.85/oz and traded 0.1% less at 1.1316.