Europe open: Stocks move higher as trade tensions reduce

On that note, Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets UK said: "Despite the continuation of recent volatility that has characterised movements in stock markets over the past few months, it looks like we could be set for another positive week for European markets, after yesterday’s positive session and another strong rebound in US markets.

"This would be the third successive week in succession that we’ve managed to finish higher in Europe and suggest that, despite concerns about an escalation in trade tensions, as well as a possible break-out of hostilities in the Middle East, that stock markets may well be starting to carve out some form of short term base."

As of 0950 BST, the benchmark Stoxx 600 was higher by 0.14% or 0.53 points at 379.35, alongside a rise of 0.41% or 50.64 points to 12,465.65 for the German Dax and a gain of 0.17% or 8.89 points to 5,318.11 on the Cac-40.

Banks were doing especially well, with the Stoxx 600's gauge of lenders' shares gaining 0.53% to 176.73.

Speaking overnight, Donald Trump said of China "now we're really negotiating and I think they're going to treat us really fairly." The US president also sounded a confident note on the ongoing NAFTA talks, saying they were coming along great.

Regarding the ongoing situation in the Middle East, overnight it was reported that the US Secretary of Defence, James Mattis, had argued in favour of obtaining more evidence of the use of chemical weapons in Syria before any strike, in order buttress the case for action in the eyes of world opinion.

Only second-tier economic indicators were coming out from the euro area on Friday, although the details of some of the reports were interesting, revealing a drop in Eurozone imports during February and firmer 'core' consumer prices in Germany.

The euro area's seasonally-adjusted trade surplus improved from €20.2bn for January to €21.0bn in February, according to Eurostat, but only because of a sharp 3.1% fall in import volumes.

Meanwhile, in Germany, the Ministry of Finance confirmed that consumer prices picked-up from a 1.4% year-on-year pace in January to 1.6% for February, as expected.

Commenting on the figures, Claus Vistesen at Pantheon Macroeconomics said: "Overall, we think both headline and core inflation in Germany will edge higher in coming months.

"At 1.6% the core rate is not far off where it peaked in previous business cycles, but we see risks that strong growth and a record-low unemployment this time around will push it towards 2% in the next 12 months."

On the corporate side of things, shares in German lender Deutsche Bank were tracking gains overnight in their US-listed peers, even after Standard&Poor's placed its rating on the bank's long-term debt on credit watch 'negative'.