CAC 40 Down Nearly 0.5%

(RTTNews) - French stocks are exhibiting weakness on Friday with investors largely cautious ahead of Fitch Ratings' review of France's sovereign credit rating. Expectations of a rate cut by the Federal Reserve next week appear to be limiting market's downside.

Investors are digesting data showing France's consumer price inflation eased slightly as initially estimated in August.

The benchmark CAC 40 was down 35.45 points or 0.45% at 7,788.07 a few minutes ago.

Stellantis, down 2.6%, is the biggest loser in the benchmark CAC 40 index. Hermes International is down 1.7% and Renault is down 1.6%.

Societe Generae and EssilorLuxottica are down 1.2% and 1.1%, respectively. L'Oreal, TotalEnergies, Airbus, BNP Paribas, Pernod Ricard, Vinci and Carrefour are also down in negative territory.

Among the gainers, Thales is up 1.8%. Unibail Rodamco, Capgemini, Bureau Veritas, Ederned and Eurofins Scientific are advancing by 0.4 to 0.8%.

France's consumer price inflation eased slightly as initially estimated in August, the latest data from the statistical office INSEE showed on Friday.

Data from INSEE showed consumer price inflationin France moderated to 0.9% in August from 1% in July, in line with the flash data published on August 29.

Inflation, based on the Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices, also slowed to 0.8% in August from 0.9% a month ago, as estimated.

Month-on-month, the consumer price index registered a 0.4% rise after July's 0.2% increase. Likewise, HICP inflation accelerated to 0.5% from 0.3%. There was no change in figures compared to the preliminary estimate.