The French market is falling on Thursday, after Greece announced it would hold fresh elections on June 17. The European Central Bank has reportedly halted monetary policy operations to some Greek lenders to reduce its risk.
ECB President Mario Draghi is of the view that the lender would not compromise on its key principles to keep the debt-ridden nation in the euro area. Reports on Wednesday said Greece's Central bank Chief George Provopoulos told President Karolos Papoulias that people withdrew as much as 700 million euros amid the uncertainty, and banks fear about their survival.
Alexis Tsipras, leader of Greece's far-left Syriza coalition that came in second in last week's indecisive Parliament elections, has accused the European Union and German Chancellor Angela Merkel of "playing poker with people's life" by insisting the implementation painful austerity measures agreed earlier by Greece under previous bailout deals.
Tsipras was quoted as saying in a BBC interview on Wednesday that the "disease of austerity destroys Greece, it will spread to the rest of Europe." He added that the "European leadership and especially Mrs Merkel need to stop playing poker with the lives of people."
Meanwhile, Spain's borrowing costs increased at a short-term debt auction, which met the maximum target. The treasury sold 2.5 billion euros, compared to the target range of 1.5 billion euros to 2.5 billion euros.
The Euro Stoxx 50 index of eurozone bluechip stocks is losing 1.15 percent, while the Stoxx Europe 50 index, which includes some major U.K. companies, is falling 0.80 percent.
The CAC 40 index is losing about 1 percent.
Credit Agricole, Societe Generale and BNP Paribas are losing between 4.1 percent and 3.1 percent.
Those losing notably on the index include Axa, Alstom, ArcelorMittal, Carrefour, Alcatel Lucent and STMicroelectronics.
Peugeot is notably lower, while Renault is adding 0.7 percent.
Pernod-Ricard is gaining 1.25 percent.
Elsewhere in Europe, the German DAX is losing 0.71 percent and the UK's FTSE 100 is declining 1.10 percent.
Across Asia/Pacific, markets had a mixed outing. Australia's All Ordinaries slid 0.15 percent and Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.31 percent. In China, Shanghai Composite Index climbed 1.4 percent and Japan's Nikkei 225 gained 0.9 percent.
In the U.S., the minutes from the last FOMC meeting in the U.S. showed that "several" members are in favor of additional asset purchases if the economic recovery falters. The futures point to a more or less unchanged open on Wall Street.
In the previous session, stocks failed to sustain an early upward move. The major averages ended the day in negative territory, near their worst levels of the day. The Dow slipped 0.3 percent, the Nasdaq fell 0.7 percent and the S&P 500 dropped 0.4 percent.
In the commodity space, crude for June delivery is adding $0.11 to $92.92 per barrel and June gold is rising $10.5 to $1547.1 a troy ounce.
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