European stocks on Monday rebounded from last week’s losses, on speculation ABN Amro Holding NV will be acquired and Imperial Tobacco Group PLC will raise its bid for Altadis SA.
Shares of ABN Amro, the parent of Chicago’s LaSalle Bank, surged to a record after a person familiar with the situation said Barclays is in talks about buying the largest Dutch bank.
Merger and acquisition deals “continue to come through, and this is supportive of the market,” said Philippe Gijsels, senior equity strategist at Fortis Bank SA’s private investment unit in Brussels. “M&A is becoming more and more important when other drivers, such as earnings, are slowing.”
The Dow Jones Stoxx 600 index climbed 1.5 percent. The Stoxx 50 also added 1.5 percent, and the Euro Stoxx 50, a measure for the nations sharing the euro, gained 1.8 percent.
YEN DROP AIDS RISE IN ASIA: Asian stocks gained, rebounding after a third straight weekly loss. Canon Inc. and Toyota Motor Corp. led Japanese exporters higher after the yen weakened against the dollar.
“The dollar-yen is coming back again quite sharply,” said Masafumi Oshiden, a fund manager in Tokyo at BlackRock Japan Co. “This is why the exporters are being bought today.”
The Morgan Stanley Capital International Asia-Pacific index gained 0.8 percent. Japan’s Nikkei 225 index rose 1.6 percent, and the broader Topix added 1 percent. The Philippines Stock Exchange index fell 0.7 percent. Pakistan and Thailand were the only other regional markets to fall.
