European stocks fall for third straight day as Airbus sheds 4%

European stocks fell on Thursday, to deepen losses for the third day and pulled back further from a 1-year high, on profit-taking and disappointing earnings results by major European companies, led by the giant aircraft manufacturer Airbus, as its shares lost nearly 4% after reporting an operating loss in 2020.

The Stoxx Europe 600 index fell 0.3% as of 11:25 GMT, after closing lower by 0.75% yesterday on profit taking from a 1-year high of 420.6 points, in the second straight daily gain.

The banking sector saw the largest losses in Europe today, falling around 1%, after disappointing earnings reports by Credit Suisse and Barclays Bank.

Airbus stock fell nearly 4% after the French aircraft manufacturer reported €510 million operating loss in 2020, and its core operating profit fell 75% due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

S&P 500 futures fell 0.5%, and jumped to all-time record high after the index closed lower by 0.1% yesterday at Wall Street on profit-taking from a record high of 3,950.43 points.

Back to Europe, the Euro Stoxx 50 index fell 0.4%, France's CAC 40 fell 0.5%, the UK's FTSE 100 fell 0.9%, and Germany DAX index fell 0.2%.