From France's tumultuous snap election to anemic economic growth in Germany, European equities have not been immune to serious uncertainty this year. Yet, as October beds in, the EuroStoxx 50 has hit 5,003.99 points, slowly creeping back up to the record highs it last saw in the noughties.
Despite domestic issues, over the last 12 months, European equities have been a lucrative haven for investors, benefiting from cuts to interest rates and falling inflation globally. But that is the general picture. Michael Field, European Market Strategist at Morningstar, says how you did will very much have depended on where you were invested, and in what.
That won't change as the final quarter of the year progresses. "By aggregate [the] market is up more than 20% over the last twelve months," he says. "But within that it has been really mixed across the sectors.
If you were invested in consumer stocks, which have not been a great place to be all year, you would have only made 1.5% or 3% depending on your stake in consumer staples versus defensives." Energy has also been disappointing, although Field points to financial services as one of the standout sectors amid a recovery from the March 2023 banking crisis, which soured sentiment in financial services across Europe and led ultimately to the acquisition of Credit Suisse by UBS UBSG.
"If you were investing in financial services, which [bounced back] since the banking crisis, you would have made a third of your money back in the space of 1.
