12:17 PM EDT, 11/01/2024 (MT Newswires) -- The European stock markets closed out a rough week sharply higher in Friday trading as The Stoxx Europe climbed 1.31%, the Swiss Market Index surged 1.63%, France's CAC rose 1.09%, the FTSE in London gained 1.07%, and Germany's DAX closed 1.10% higher.

In the UK, the seasonally adjusted S&P Global UK Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index fell to 49.9 in October from 51.5 in September, slipping into contraction territory for the first time since April. S&P attributed the decline in large part to a lack of consumer confidence and an economic slowdown.

Meanwhile, UK house prices declined to 265,738 British pounds ($344,418) in October from 266,094 British pounds in September, according to the latest Nationwide House Price Index.

In Switzerland, the consumer price index declined 0.1% in October compared with the previous month and was up 0.6% compared with a year earlier, according to the Swiss Federal Statistical.

And in corporate news, shares of UK-based Reckitt Benckiser rose more than 7% in Friday trading in London after a jury ruled Thursday that its US-based subsidiary Mead Johnson was not responsible in a lawsuit over baby formulas for premature babies, according to multiple media reports.

Novo Nordisk said Friday that the first part of an ongoing phase 3 trial in people with liver fibrosis and metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis reached its primary endpoints. Shares of the Danish pharmaceutical company closed 1% higher in Copenhagen.

Deutsche Bank is among four banks looking to recover their share of 2.3 billion euros ($2.48 billion) levied by German regulators for a recovery fund created in response to the 2008 financial crisis, according to media reports Thursday. Deutsche Bank shares were 1.5% higher in Frankfurt.

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