Mar 28 (Reuters) - Spain's IBEX 35 stock index was slightly lower at the open on Thursday as profit-taking snapped a bullish streak of seven consecutive rises, but was set to enter the Easter break at its highest levels in nearly seven years.

March could also close with an increase of more than 10%, its biggest advance since November 2023, while the first quarter advance would be more than 9% if it ended at current levels.

Contributing to this rally has been growing confidence among investors that, beyond the timing and pace, interest rates in the major economic powers will end the year at lower levels than at present, thereby boosting economic growth and the profits of listed companies.

Even so, trading on Thursday - a holiday in part of Spain - is expected to be limited, as investors await important macroeconomic and monetary references that will not be reflected in prices until after the Easter holidays.

On Friday, the underlying personal consumption deflator in the United States, the preferred inflation measure of the US Federal Reserve (Fed), will be released, and Fed Chairman Jerome Powell will make comments on the same day.

These news, as well as other important indicators and benchmarks, will be known when the European markets are already closed for Easter - most of them will not reopen until Tuesday, April 2 -, so there will be little incentive to take risk positions beforehand.

After closing Wednesday at its highest level since May 5, 2017, at 08:15 GMT on Thursday the selective Spanish stock market IBEX 35 was down 43.40 points, or 0.39%, to 11,067.90 points, while the FTSE Eurofirst 300 index of large European stocks advanced 0.18%.

In the banking sector, Santander rose 0.44%, BBVA gained 0.37%, Caixabank gave up 7.11%, Sabadell gained 0.80%, Bankinter dropped 0.12%, and Unicaja Banco rose 0.53%.

Among the large non-financial stocks, Telefónica gained 0.46%, Inditex advanced 0.15%, Iberdrola dropped 0.09%, Cellnex fell 0.06%, and the oil company Repsol rose 0.52%.

(Information by Tomás Cobos; edited by Javi West Larrañaga)