12:10 PM EST, 03/02/2026 (MT Newswires) -- The European stock markets were sharply lower in Monday trading as investors were rattled by a Middle East war started by the US' attack on Iran over the weekend.

The Stoxx Europe fell 1.7%, Germany's DAX tumbled 2.4%, the FTSE 100 lost 1.2%, France's CAC dropped 2.2%, and the Swiss Market Index declined 1.3%.

The HCOB Eurozone Manufacturing PMI, which gauges the overall health of the eurozone manufacturing sector compiled by S&P Global, rose above the 50.0 threshold and into expansion territory for the first time since August. The index rose to 50.8 in February from 49.5 in January.

"This seems to be a broad-based recovery of the eurozone manufacturing sector, with six out of the eight surveyed countries now in growth territory," Hamburg Commercial Bank Chief Economist Cyrus de la Rubia said in a statement. "Among the four economic powerhouses of Europe, Germany is showing the fastest growth rate in manufacturing."

And in corporate news, Barclays had been blocking certain transactions linked to London-based mortgage provider Market Financial Solutions months before the firm collapsed last week amid fraud allegations, the Financial Times reported Monday.

The report said the bank froze all MFS accounts in January after spotting irregularities.

Shares of the British lender fell 3.4% in London.

Rio Tinto has suspended negotiations with Japanese customers over Q2 aluminum supply due to instability in the Middle East following the US and Israeli war against Iran, Bloomberg reported Monday, citing people familiar with the negotiations.

The miner has rescinded an initial offer of a premium of $250 per ton, citing the potential impact of the Middle East war on metal prices, the report said.

Rio Tinto approved a $473 million investment in the Zulti South mining project near Richards Bay, South Africa, lifting a suspension that has been in place since January 2020, the company said Monday.

Shares of the mining company were little changed in London.

Novo Nordisk said Monday it is planning to invest 432 million euros ($507.1 million) to upgrade its tableting facility in Athlone, Ireland.

This tableting site will offer additional production capacity for current and future GLP-1 treatments, according to the Danish drug manufacturer.

Shares of the Danish pharmaceutical company were off 0.2% in Copenhagen.

Sanofi said Monday that Japan's Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare has granted orphan drug designation to its experimental medicine rilzabrutinib to treat IgG4-related disease.

The company said orphan drug status in Japan is given to treatments targeting rare diseases or conditions with significant unmet medical needs.

Shares of the French pharmaceutical company declined 0.9% in Paris.

ASML plans to expand its chipmaking equipment beyond extreme ultraviolet systems and into advanced packaging tools that are becoming critical for manufacturing AI processors, Reuters reported Monday, citing Chief Technology Officer Marco Pieters.

The company is also researching whether it can increase the maximum chip size its systems can print, the report said.

Shares of the Dutch semiconductor company dropped 1.9% in Amsterdam.

Vodafone Group said Monday it agreed to use Amazon's low Earth orbit satellite broadband network, Amazon Leo, to connect remote 4G and 5G mobile sites in Europe and Africa.

The integration will allow the telecommunications provider to deploy base stations in unserved areas without installing physical fiber links while establishing backup connectivity during network outages, the company said.

Shares of Vodafone lost 1.5% in London.

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