Banks up 2.4%, the DAX back above 26,000, and an analyst who calls it AI fatigue

Friday’s slide ended on Monday morning. By midday Reuters had the DAX up 1.1% at 26,102, back above the 26,000 mark, after losing nearly 2% on Friday; the Euro Stoxx 50 was up 1.3%¹. Sharecast had the Stoxx 600 up 0.90% at 654 at 13:17 CET². These are intraday readings, not closes; the settled close comes in the 19:30 update.

Look at who led. Not the chips, but the banks. Europe’s banking index rose 2.4%, Reuters reported¹. Crédit Agricole proposed merging its Italian business with Banco BPM, which would create Italy’s third-largest bank; Banco BPM shares were up almost 12% at one point^1,2. UniCredit beat forecasts for third-quarter earnings, raised its full-year guidance and rose 6.3%^1,2. In Frankfurt, Commerzbank topped the DAX with a gain of 3.8% and Deutsche Bank added 2.8%¹.

That is a different kind of rally from the one that broke last week. A bank result is a ledger: loans, deposits, trading income, provisions. It can be checked against the next one. Jochen Stanzl of Consorsbank put the mood in one phrase, a “growing AI fatigue” among investors (desk translation), who no longer pay any valuation for big promises but “want to see results”¹.

The tech side had its own reminder. Nvidia opened an internal investigation after its chief executive Jensen Huang admitted an affair with a woman reported to be suspected of spying for China, and the shares fell more than 4% in US premarket trading^1,2. Chris Weston of Pepperstone said he did not believe Huang would be replaced¹. You need no view on that. You need only notice that one company’s governance can move a whole theme.

Desk arithmetic: from Friday’s close of 648.33³ to Monday’s midday 654, the Stoxx 600 had won back about 5.7 points, roughly 0.9%. Nothing here is investment advice.