European equity markets were set to open lower on Wednesday, mirroring declines in global equities as investors remained wary of persistently high bond yields and rising oil prices. Sentiment was further dampened by renewed selling in AI-related chipmakers, which added pressure to regional stocks.
In Europe, attention will center on fresh inflation data from the UK and the Eurozone, as well as comments from ECB President Christine Lagarde. On Tuesday, ECB Chief Economist Philip Lane noted that the region’s 3% inflation rate remains “too high” in the context of potential policy rate adjustments.
No major corporate earnings releases are scheduled in Europe for Wednesday. In premarket trading, futures on the Euro Stoxx 50 and Stoxx 600 indices were both down about 0.2%.