By Michael Msika, Jan-Patrick Barnert, Bloomberg Markets Live reporter and strategist
Reasons to prefer European stocks were non-existent just a few months ago. Now the region is on a tear, boosted by geopolitical and monetary tailwinds.
European stocks have never left US markets this far behind at the start of a year. The Stoxx Europe 600 leads the S&P 500 Index by about 4 percentage points in dollar terms. That’s slightly more than the previous record set in 2006 and only the 10th time it’s happened in data going back to the start of the century. The shake up in leadership can be traced to investors favoring last year’s cheap underperformers in Europe over pricier Wall Street stocks. Early evidence of economic and political improvement in the region is adding impetus.
