Europe close: Stocks start month on front foot

At the closing bell the Stoxx 50 was 0.35% higher to 3567.02, alongside gains of 0.4% for Germany's Dax to 12,664.92 and a rise of 0.66% in the Cac-40 to 5,318.67.

Data out of the Eurozone on Thursday was pleasing.

Markit´s euro area manufacturing sector purchasing managers' index for May increased from a print of 56.7 for April to 57.0 - its highest since April 2011 - just as expected.

Significantly, a gauge of new orders climbed to a more than six-year high, even as two sub-indices tracking cost pressures eased to multi-month lows.

"The increase in new orders, together with a rising backlog of works, suggests that manufacturing confidence should remain at healthy levels in the months ahead," said economists at Barclays Research.

In parallel, ISTAT announced that Italy's economy grew at a 1.2% pace year-on-year during the first quarter, beating forecasts for a rate of expansion of 0.8%.

US private sector firms added 253,000 new hires in May (consensus: 180,000), following a gain of 174,000 in the month before, according to consultancy ADP.

Meanwhile, factory sector activity Stateside kept up a solid pace of expansion during that same month, with the ISM national gauge for the sector edging up from 54.8 for April to 54.9 in May (consensus: 54.6).

Also buoying sentiment, the US Department of Energy reported a 6.4m barrel drop in the country's commercial stockpiles of crude oil.

That sent the Stoxx 600's gauge of oil & gas firms bounding 0.50% higher to 307.32 as crude oil futures bounced back.

Acting as a backdrop, overnight German central bank chief Jens Wiedmann sounded a hawkish note on monetary policy, telling an audience that the recent strengthening of the euro area's economy made it more likely that recent higher inflation was not just a "flash in the pan".

In corporate news, the Stoxx 600 bank's sector index was ended up by 0.12% even as stock in Banco Popular´s crumbled another 18% amid media speculation that the troubled lender might not be able to find a buyer.

Meanwhile, Spain's Unicaja Banco announced its intention to float 40.4% of its capital.

Shares in Akzo Nobel rose even after rival US paint giant PPG Industries dropped a $27.6bn takeover offer.

Fincatieri was also in the news after French president Emmanuel Macron said he wanted to review the terms of the sale agreement of the STX France shipyard to the Italian group.