European stocks rise for second straight session on vaccine hopes

European stocks rose on Monday, to head for the second straight daily gain, on improved market sentiment thanks to hopes of a coronavirus vaccine and a wave of major mergers and acquisitions deals.

The Stoxx Europe 600 index rose 0.2% as of 10:12 GMT, after it closed higher by 1.1% on Friday, thanks to mergers and acquisitions activity.

The index gained about 1.8% during the past week, and posted its second weekly gain in 3, after the ECB council eased market's fears about the eurozone's economic recovery. 

The pan European index opened higher today, to head for the second straight daily gain, with most of the major European markets and sectors seeing green today.

The travel and leisure sector saw the largest gains in Europe today, rising over 0.7%, after positive news about a coronavirus vaccine.

AstraZeneca has reportedly resumed the phase 3 of its coronavirus vaccine clinical trials, after the trials were suspended last week due to safety concerns.

The US chip maker Nvidia announced that it will buy the UK-based chip designer Arm, from the Japanese SoftBank Group for up to $40 billion.

S&P 500 futures rose over 1.1%, after the index closed higher by less than 0.1% on Friday, but lost over 2.5% last weak due to profit-taking.

Back to Europe, the Euro Stoxx 50 index added 0.2%, France's CAC 40 rose 0.4%, Germany's DAX added 0.1%, and the UK's FTSE 100 rose 0.1%.