01:12 PM EDT, 03/17/2023 (MT Newswires) -- European bourses ended the last trading day of a tumultuous week in the red, reversing gains from the day before.

At close of Friday trading, the Stoxx Europe 600 was down 1.2%, London's FTSE 100 lost 1%, the Swiss Market Index fell 1.1%, France's CAC 40 slipped 1.4% and Germany's DAX was off 1.3%.

Bank shares continued to weigh on global markets, with the Euro Stoxx Banks Index down near 3% and the FTSE 350 Banks also closing nearly 3% in the red.

Eurostat confirmed the eurozone's annual inflation rate at 8.5% in February, down from 8.6% in January. Meanwhile, the region's hourly labor costs in Q4 2022 grew much faster at 5.7% from Q3's 3.7% rise.

In corporate news, Volkswagen added 1.7% in Germany amid plans to invest in mines to reduce battery cell costs and boost the reach of its PowerCo battery unit. "The bottleneck for raw materials is mining capacity - that's why we need to invest in mines directly," board member Thomas Schmall told Reuters in an interview.

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