The French market reversed early losses and is moderately higher in afternoon trading Friday, as Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou reshuffled his cabinet as part of his efforts to gather support for the Socialist government's austerity measures to avoid default. Commodities have cut their losses and U.S. stock index futures have turned positive.
Current Defense Minister Evangelos Venizelos will be the new Finance Minister of Greece, a government spokesperson said.
The Euro Stoxx 50 index of eurozone bluechip stocks is adding 1.13 percent, while the Stoxx Europe 50 index, which includes some major U.K. companies, is gaining 0.30 percent.
The CAC 40 index opened lower at 3,775, compared to the previous close of 3792. The index remained in negative territory in early trade, but is currently adding 0.58 percent.
Insurer Axa is gaining 2.1 percent. Credit Agricole, BNP Paribas and Societe Generale are gaining between 1.5 percent and 0.9 percent.
Grocery retailer Carrefour is declining 2.1 percent. Unicredit cut its price target on the stock to 30 euros from 33 euros, while JPMorgan kept the stock at "Overweight" with a price target of 45 euros.
ArcelorMittal is falling 0.6 percent. Goldman Sachs cut its price target on the steel giant to 33 euros from 34 euros.
Elsewhere in Europe, the German DAX is adding 0.45 percent, while the UK's FTSE 100 is rising 0.06 percent. Switzerland's SMI is falling 0.10 percent.
In economic news, the euro area trade balance showed a shortfall of 4.1 billion euros in April compared to a surplus of 1.6 billion euros in March, data from Eurostat showed. Economists had forecast a shortfall of 1.9 billion euros for April.
Across Asia/Pacific, most major markets ended lower. China's Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.77 percent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng retreated 1.17 percent and Japan's Nikkei 225 gave up 0.64 percent. However, Australia's All Ordinaries edged up 0.1 percent.
In the U.S., futures point to a higher open on Wall Street. In the previous session, the major averages bounced back and forth across the unchanged line before closing mixed. The Dow rose 0.5 percent and the S&P 500 added 0.2 percent, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 0.3 percent.
In the commodity space, crude for July delivery is declining $1.34 to $93.61 per barrel and August gold is sliding $2.2 to $1527.7 a troy ounce.
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May 08, 2026 15:50 ET Manufacturing and services sector survey results and labor market data from main economies were the highlight on the economics news front this week. Factory orders and jobs report dominated the news flow in the U.S. Similarly, industrial production data from German garnered attention in Europe. In Asia, purchasing managers’ survey results from China and the central bank decision from Australia were in focus.