European stock markets are expected to open higher Wednesday, helped by upbeat comments from the ECB, but concerns remain about the strength of the global economic recovery.
At 2:05 AM ET (0605 GMT), the DAX Futures contract in Germany traded 0.3% higher, CAC 40 Futures in France climbed 0.6% and the FTSE 100 Futures contract in the U.K. rose 0.6%.
Helping the tone Wednesday were comments by ECB Vice President Luis de Guindos, stating in a Spanish newspaper that the Eurozone economy is growing quicker than the European Central Bank expected.
“The economy is performing better in 2021 than we expected, and this will be reflected in the projections that will be published in the coming days,” El Confidencial quoted de Guindos as saying on Wednesday.
However, this could also result in the sooner than expected withdrawal of the central bank’s stimulus, especially after Tuesday’s Eurozone Inflation data showed consumer prices increased by 3% in August, far above expectations and the European Central Bank’s 2% target. The accounts of the last ECB policy-meeting also acknowledged the risk of excessive inflation for the first time in years.
Back in Europe, German Retail Sales slumped 5.1% on the month in July, way below expectations, setting the scene for the release of the latest Eurozone Unemployment figures figures for July and August manufacturing PMI data.
Crude prices rose Wednesday, supported by a larger-than-expected decline in weekly U.S. oil stocks and ahead of a meeting of the group of top producers to determine future production levels.
The FTSE MIB climbed up by  0.97% to 26,260.30. In the cash markets, the DAX  Germany was trading up 0.76%  to 15,955.65. CAC 40  in France  rose by 1.06 % to 6,750.22 while the FTSE 100  in the U.K. were up by 0.70% to 7,167.35. ,at the time of writing.
