The Paris Bourse is down nearly 0.5%, around 7095 points, after the Fed announced last night that it intends to continue raising rates despite concerns about the health of the banking system.

Unsurprisingly, on Wednesday, the Fed raised its target for the federal funds rate by a quarter point, and said it would consider further rate hikes in the light of persistently higher-than-expected inflation.

With regard to the recent turmoil in the financial markets, the Fed acknowledged that the banking turbulence was likely to affect both growth and employment in the USA. The Treasury believes that no new rescue plans for the US banking sector are necessary for the time being

In the face of the Fed's uncertainty over the timing of its next rate hikes, Wall Street ended on a weak note last night, with the Dow Jones and Nasdaq both down 1.6%.

On the currency markets, the dollar bore the brunt of the New York Stock Exchange's decline and concerns about growth, with the greenback now trading at around 1.0910 against the euro.

Risk aversion benefited bonds, pushing the yield on 10-year Treasuries - the US benchmark bond - down towards 3.50%.

Carried along by Wall Street's decline, oil prices also fell, with the May contract for US light crude (West Texas Intermediate, WTI) losing 0.7% to $70.4.

Gold, the safe-haven par excellence, benefited from the downturn on Wall Street and in the dollar, in a "flight to quality" movement that took the fine metal up 0.9% to 1981.9 dollars an ounce, still at all-time highs.

Thursday promises to be poor in terms of economic indicators, but trading could liven up at midday with the Bank of England's (BoE) decisions.

While economists had hitherto expected a limited rate hike of 25 basis points, yesterday's announcement of a re-acceleration of inflation in February argues, according to some, for an increase of 50 points.

In news from French companies, Valneva announced a net loss of 143.3 million euros in 2022, compared with a loss of 73.4 million the previous year, as well as a negative adjusted EBITDA which rose from 47.1 to 69.2 million year-on-year.

Voltalia reported net income (Group share) of -7.2 million euros for the past year, compared with -1.3 million in 2021, and stable EBITDA at 137.4 million (-10% at constant exchange rates), penalized by the deconsolidation of power plants sold in November 2021.

Aubay is reporting record net income of 35.6 million euros for 2022, compared with 34.4 million in 2021, and an operating margin down 0.2 points to 10.4%, on sales up 9.1% to 513.5 million.

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