Key European indexes are mixed

On Wednesday, EU markets were generally mixed in the face of a worsening political downtime in the eurozone's number three economy.

The European index Stoxx 600 didn’t change during the morning trading session, with sectors as well as large exchanges pointing in opposite directions.

As for the national indices, the Italian FTSE MIB revived a bit after fixing steep losses in recent days. Italy's political issues stirred global financial markets in the face of news about the prospects for early elections in Italy, which could be called a referendum on the role of the country in the European Union.

The European banking index led losses, losing more than 0.7% because traders feared that political turmoil in Italy could ultimately impact the banking system of the region. As a matter of fact, Credit Agricole, Close Brothers Group and Credit Suisse turned out to be the worst sectorial performers after the opening of the markets - all slumped by more than 1%.

Meanwhile, Umicore in Belgium managed to ascend to the top of the index after ING raised the target price of equities of the group of global materials technologies as well as processing. These stocks edged up by 2.5%.

In Asia, on Wednesday, shares dived because the power struggle in Italy influenced the global financial markets. The largest MSCI index in the Asia-Pacific region, excluding Japan, went down 1.5%.

Meanwhile, the echoes of Italy’s political coup also provoked a steep dive on Wall Street. Stock indices in the United States were weakened by a sag in the banking sector. The Dow Jones industrial index headed south by nearly 400 points, while the S&P 500 along with Nasdaq dipped too.

It was a third losing consecutive trading session for the Dow and S&P 500, with both indexes facing their worst day on a percentage basis since April 24.