European shares rose by midsession on Friday, extending a winning streak to five days, with automakers rising and banks gaining as Bank of America continued the trend of strong second-quarter earnings, Reuters reported. At 1109 GMT, the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares was up 0.6 percent at 872.40 points after hitting its highest closing level in a month on Thursday. The index is up more than 35 percent from its lifetime low of March 9, as investors have become more confident on the prospects of recovery. It has risen 7.1 percent this week, on track to post its best weekly gain since late November last year. "The catalyst has been the Q2 earnings, mainly Goldman Sachs and Intel," said Philip Lawlor, strategist at Nomura, in London. "Before that people, had been worried that the green shoots weren't really coming through." "What we've seen is the return of risk appetite. There's more confidence that analysts estimates won't be out by a wide margin." Bank of America said second-quarter revenue rose 60 percent. Other U.S. companies to report strong second-quarter eearnings this week included JP Morgan and IBM. On Friday, General Electric Co said profit fell by almost half on a deeper drop in revenue than Wall Street expected, as the slump that has gripped its finance and media businesses took hold of its heavy industrial units. Back in Europe, banks were among the top gainers. BNP Paribas, Barclays, HSBC and Societe Generale were up between 1.4 and 2.2 percent. Swedbank reversed earlier losses to trade up 10 percent despite posting a bigger-than-expected second quarter operating loss, hurt by huge provisions for souring credits in the recession-hit Baltic region. The DJ Stoxx Banking Index has risen more than 10 percent this week. Automakers also extended gains from recent days. Daimler rose 2.5 percent, after Goldman Sachs reiterated its "conviction buy" rating and lifted its price target to 38 euros from 35 euros. BMW rose 2.5 percent after Nomura upgraded it to "neutral". Oils were higher with crude little changed just below $62 a barrel. BG, BP and Total were up between 0.9 and 2 percent. Among miners, Anglo American, Antofagasta, BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata were up between 2 and 5.2 percent. Across Europe, Britain's FTSE 100, Germany's DAX and France's CAC 40 each gained 0.9 percent. UBS lifted its year-end target for the FTSEurofirst 300 to 1,000 from 900, or an increase of nearly 15 percent from the current level, as it expected a turn in the earnings cycle. British Airways rose 5.9 percent as the market responded well to plans to raise around 600 million pounds ($1 billion) through a combination of bondholder debt and bank credit. On the downside, French group Accor sank 7.8 percent after it posted a 9 percent drop in second quarter sales as the economic crisis weighed on its hotel business. Carrefour, the world's second-biggest retailer behind U.S. group Wal-Mart, was down 3 percent. After the market closed on Thursday, the company said second-quarter sales fell 1.2 percent, hurt by weaker western European markets, lower petrol prices and exchange rates.
