Paris (AFP)

The Paris Bourse was cautious at midday on Wednesday (-0.17%), sweeping away the optimism of the past few days, pending the end of the meeting of the Fed's monetary committee and the speech of its president.

At 1:49 p.m. (11:39 GMT), the CAC 40 index lost 7.82 points to 4,561.97 points, in a trading volume of 946 million euros. The day before, it had finished up 1.43%.

The Parisian rating opened close to balance and evolved during the session without straying too far, in a day rich in economic news.

"In addition to the current profit season, investors will also focus on the Federal Reserve meetings" on Wednesday and the European Central Bank on Thursday, Milan Axkorp analyst Milan Cutkovic said in a note.

According to him, "it is unlikely that the Federal Reserve will cut rates even more sharply today".

The meeting of the Fed's monetary committee is scheduled to end on Wednesday and will be followed by a press conference by its president Jerome Powell.

US economic outlook "remains bleak," says Cutkovic, and team led by Jerome Powell "could once again remind markets that the Fed has not run out of ammunition and that an extension of the stimulus package is possible".

Side indicators, the inflation rate in Germany decelerated well in March, falling to 1.4% year on year in the wake of the coronavirus crisis, according to final figures published by the Destatis Institute.

In the United States, GDP for the first quarter as well as the weekly report on oil stocks in the United States are also expected.

- Airbus tops the ACC -

In terms of indicators, Airbus took the lead in the CAC 40 (+ 5.69% to 55.89 euros), despite a net loss of 481 million euros in the first quarter, against a net profit of 40 million euros one year earlier. The group said it saw "quickly" the effects of the coronavirus epidemic in its accounts.

Carrefour was in demand (+ 3.62% to 13.88 euros), supported by an increase in its turnover in the first quarter, marked by a "very strong acceleration" of its activity in March due to the epidemic of coronavirus, which has benefited from its outreach and online activities.

M6 yielded 2.30% to 9.79 euros, affected by the announcement of a plan to reduce its costs on its programs and on all of its activities, after a drop of 7.1% in its turnover business in the first quarter due to the coronavirus epidemic.

STMicroelectronics (+ 0.86% to 24.51 euros) maintained a target of 12 billion euros in turnover by 2021-22 despite the crisis linked to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Teleperformance jumped 7.39% to 205 euros, thanks to the publication of sales up 6.4% to 1.3 billion euros in the first quarter. But the group expects a decline in the second quarter and intends to reduce its costs.

© 2020 AFP