A trader uses a telephone as she works on computer screens at the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. The DAX closed above the symbolic 10,000 level for the first time yesterday.

AFP/London

Europe’s main stock markets rose in lacklustre holiday trade yesterday, with Frankfurt’s DAX closing above the symbolic 10,000 level for the first time.

“With a lack of economic data, European shares were soft today after the solid gains made last week in expectation of and as a result of ECB stimulus and the goldilocks US jobs report,” said analyst Jasper Lawler at CMC Markets UK.

“With Germany and France out for Whit Monday, volumes were particularly thin in what is already a period of unusually low volatility,” he added.

Nevertheless the DAX 30 managed to pick up 0.21% to finish the day at 10,008.63 points.

London’s FTSE 100 index of top companies tacked on 0.24% to 6,875 points, while the CAC 40 in Paris added 0.17% to reach its highest point since June 2008 at 4,589.12 points.

Milan rose 0.82% and Madrid 0.90%.

“The context is favourable thanks to the monetary policies of central banks even if it is possible to have short-term consolidations,” said Saxo Banque analyst Christopher Dembik.

“For the moment, the rise is self-supporting” with technical trade dominating, he added.

In a move hailed as “unprecedented” by analysts, the European Central Bank last week lowered rates across the board and pushed the rate at which it pays commercial banks for depositing their unused cash into negative territory for the time, cutting it from zero% to minus 0.10%.

This means banks will be charged for depositing their excess cash with the ECB in a bid to encourage lending, and the central bank said it would also make up to 400bn euros in cheap long-term funds available to eurozone lenders.

Official data Friday showed the US economy added 217,000 jobs in May, bringing the total number in the country above the level at the beginning of the deep 2008-2009 recession for the first time.

Markets also welcomed figures released Sunday that showed China’s trade surplus surged to $35.92bn as exports increased 7.0% year-on-year and imports declined 1.6% were also well received.

The mining sector won support on the back of that data, with shares in Antofagasta rising 1.1% to 781 pence and Fresnillo also picking up 1.1% to 784 pence.

Elsewhere, shares in Lloyds Banking Group slid 1.8% to 78.67 pence. State-rescued LBG yesterday proposed a pricing of 220-290 pence a share when it floats one quarter of its TSB bank division.

US stocks headed higher after last week’s records amid a fresh burst of merger and acquisition activity on Wall Street.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.23% to 16,963.75 points in mid-day trade.

The S&P 500 gained 0.25% to 1,954.31 and the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index rose 0.57% to 4,346.01.

Tyson Foods, the world’s second-largest meat processor, won the bidding war for sausage and hot dog maker Hillshire Foods against rival Pilgrim’s Pride with an offer worth $8.6bn.

Hillshire shares jumped 5.0%, while Tyson tumbled 5.0% and Pilgrim’s dropped 5.8%.

Asian stock markets mostly rose, buoyed by another record close on Wall Street in response to an impressive US jobs report, the Chinese export figures and an upward revision of Japanese economic growth, traders said.