Europe close: Cac-40 finishes at nine-year high

The benchmark pan-European Stoxx 600 ended the session 0.67% higher at 391.98, alongside gains of 0.96% to 12,647.78 for Germany's Dax and an advance of 1.35% for Paris's Cac-40 which finished at 5,372.42.

Not unexpectedly, a snap opinion poll carried out by Elabe for BFMTV after a televised debate between the French centrist presidential candidate and his far-right rival, Marine Le Pen, on Wednesday night, showed 63% of viewers found him the more convincing of the two.

More significantly however, another poll from OpinionWay-SLPV Analytics for daily Les Echos revealed that Macron's party En Marche! was on track to garner between 249 to 286 seats out of 535 in the assembly (from a total of 577) for Continental France in the 18 June ballot.

That last result came amid concerns that even if Macron came out on top in the run-off French presidential elections on 7 May his lack of a political base would see him become a 'lame duck' president.

Tellingly, the yield spread between the benchmark 10-year French and German sovereign bonds was five basis points narrower by the end of trading at 43 as the haven bid was yanked away from German bunds.

Analysts at UniCredit Research described the debate between Macron and his far-right rival Marine Le Pen on their vision of France's future, the euro and ways of fighting terrorism as "fierce". The snap opinion poll carried out by Elabe for BFMTV after the debate showed 63% of viewers found Macron the more convincing of the two.

Nevertheless, the run-off vote in the country's presidential elections on 7 May was important and there was still room for a surprise upset, said Ipek Ozkardeskaya, market analyst at LCG.

Ozkardeskaya reminded clients that by default opinion polls do not account for those planning to abstain or to cast blank ballots, so the possibility remained that the roughly 20-point lead currently assigned to Macron might prove misleading.

In the US, there was little to report from Wednesday night's US central bank policy meeting, although markets moved quickly to discount a near certain chance of a 25 basis point rate hike at the Fed's June meeting.

IHS Markit's composite euro area purchasing managers' index for the euro area's combined manufacturing and service sectors printed at 56.8 (consensus: 56.7) for April after a reading of 56.4 for March.

Retail sales in the Eurozone also came in ahead of forecasts in March, rising by 0.3% month-on-month (consensus: 0.0%).

Stock in the world's largest brewer, Anheuser-Busch Inbev was bid up by 5% after the company bested analysts' forecasts for both sales and profits.

Shares in athletic apparel-maker Adidas meanwhile gained 0.72% after the company posted better than expected first quarter revenues and profits, thanks to its e-commerce and North America ops.

BMW posted a 31% jump in first quarter profits to reach €2.15bn sending stock in the automaker up by 0.20%.