The French market is lower in afternoon trading Thursday, reversing early gains, after inflation data from China released earlier in the day gave rise to hopes of further stimulus from the government.
Inflation in China eased for a fourth straight month to reach a 30-month low in July, paving way for the policymakers to go ahead with stimulus measures to counter a slowdown in economic growth. The rate of inflation fell to 1.8 percent in July from 2.2 percent in June, the National Bureau of Statistics said.
Meanwhile, China's producer prices declined for a fifth consecutive month, falling 2.9 percent year-on-year in July.
The Bank of Japan on Thursday decided to keep its stimulus program and key interest rate unchanged as the economy is expected to undergo a moderate recovery path.
The European Central Bank considered the high borrowing costs faced by some euro area sovereigns was mainly driven by fears of a collapse of the euro and must be tackled through fiscal consolidation and structural reforms, the bank's monthly bulletin showed.
The Euro Stoxx 50 index of eurozone bluechip stocks is adding 0.14 percent, while the Stoxx Europe 50 index, which includes some major U.K. companies, is gaining 0.26 percent.
The CAC 40 index is currently losing 0.28 percent.
GDF Suez is losing 2 percent. EDF is down 1.5 percent. France Telecom is falling 1.3 percent.
Insurer Axa is climbing 2.4 percent. Lenders Societe Generale and Credit Agricole are advancing 1.1 percent each. BNP Paribas is moderately up.
Elsewhere in Europe, the German DAX is losing 0.70 percent and the UK's FTSE 100 is falling 0.07 percent. Switzerland's SMI is climbing 0.88 percent.
Across Asia/Pacific, major markets ended mostly in positive territory. China's Shanghai Composite Index added 0.6 percent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 1 percent and Japan's Nikkei 225 climbed 1.1 percent. However, Australia's All Ordinaries slid 0.06 percent.
In the U.S., futures point to a mixed open on Wall Street. In the previous session, the major averages ended mixed, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq posting a modest loss. While the Nasdaq edged down 0.2 percent, the Dow and the S&P 500 inched up 0.1 percent each.
In the commodity space, crude for September delivery is adding $0.30 to $93.65 per barrel and December gold is losing $0.9 to $1615.1 a troy ounce.
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