Mitchells & Butlers Share News (MAB)

* STOXX falls back in the red

* Tentative rebound ends within hour

* Travel and Leisure stocks still falling

* Wall Street slightly positive
Welcome to the home for real-time coverage of European equity markets brought to you by Reuters
stocks reporters. You can share your thoughts with Thyagaraju Adinarayan
(thyagaraju.adinarayan@thomsonreuters.com), Joice Alves (joice.alves@thomsonreuters.com) and
Julien Ponthus (julien.ponthus@thomsonreuters.com) in London.

THE LOCKDOWN FACTOR (1440 GMT)

What impact will being stuck in a lockdown have on investors and traders?

Could this exacerbate fear and greed instincts, knee-jerk reactions or - on the contrary -
fuel apathy?

What happens when a close-knit pack-hunting team gets to go home? Do they simply become a
sum of domesticated lone wolves?

Here's an interesting thought today from UBS GWM chief economist Paul Donovan.

"As people become more isolated, they may obsess more about social media. Social media is a
super-spreader of fear. It confirms biases (the "echo chamber"). That could mean investors and
financial market professionals may be less rational and less efficient when working in
isolation."

Food for thought for the coming days, weeks or months.

Julien Ponthus)

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PEAK UNCERTAINTY (1255 GMT)

One optimistic way to look at the epidemic today is to take the view that we'll hopefully
get more visibility on its impact in the coming days or weeks.

"My analysis at the moment is that we are close to peak uncertainty", said Emmanuel Cau,
head of European equity strategy at Barclays, adding investors needed to have a sense of when
the epidemic would stabilise to move forward.

"The good news is that containment measures seem to have worked in China", he argued.

In the meantime, while we are still in the dark, better to be prudent.

"My advice to investors is to stay on the side-lines at the moment and take a wait-and-see
attitude", he said.

(Julien Ponthus)

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MILAN, LISBON AND MADRID HANGING ON TO THE REBOUND (1217 GMT)

While today's STOXX 600 tentative rebound - after an horrendous Monday - was short-lived,
the Italian index, Spain's blue chips and Portugal's Euronext Lisbon
are still trading in the black or close, helped by telecom and utilities stocks notably.

Telecom Italia and Iberdrola are helping Italy and Spain's bourses.

Worth mentioning that the two countries have the largest cases of coronavirus across Europe.

France, Italy and Spain banned short-selling on some stocks today to shield some of Europe's
biggest companies from a sell-off triggered by the coronavirus but France didn't resist and
slipped into negative territory after a nice bounce in earlier trade.

In Portugal, the best performer is at this point CTT Correios de Portugal.

Take a look at how Milan, Lisbon and Madrid were putting a fight:

(Joice Alves)

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ITALY'S COVID-19 CASES COULD PEAK IN A WEEK: JPM (1033 GMT)

Not many positive coronavirus-related news out there hence it is definitely worth noting
that JPM says based on its internal models it sees active cases in Italy peaking in a week.

Worth remembering that just yesterday, Italy's PM said the outbreak had still not reached
its peak and that the weeks ahead are the most risky.

Considering the five European countries together -Germany, France, Italy, Spain and the UK-
JPM's model suggests a peak towards the end of March, with active infections of close to 80,000.

Taking in consideration single countries, here is how the investment bank sees things
developing:

- The number of cases is seen relatively lower in the UK and to peak a little later compared
to the four neighbours

- Spain could peak right after Italy, next week, with similar number of Covid-19 cases

- Cases in Germany and France are also expected to peak next week with combined numbers
similar to the UK.

Here's the chart from the JPM research note:

Here's the story we wrote based on the note:

(Joice Alves)

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BUYING THE DIP COULD BE VERY DIFFERENT THIS TIME (0925 GMT)

This is no classic bear markets as there's absolutely no visibility on when it'd bottom and
there's a big scarcity of investors willing to even consider buying the dip.

But buying the dip could be different this time with governments not ruling out taking
stakes or nationalising companies.

There's a lot of ways governments could enter the capital of strategic blue chips and in
some cases, it might not be particularly friendly for existing shareholders, just like it was
for some banks in 2008-2009.

Anyhow, this newsflash is worth your attention:

(Julien Ponthus)

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THE REBOUND LASTED ONLY A FEW MINUTES (0850 GMT)

European stocks' rebound was short-lived as the gains on rising hopes of more fiscal
stimulus faded quickly with the pan European index dropping 0.8%, reversing from a 3%
gain in earlier in the morning.

"We still think there is minimal hope for a more coordinated global response," writes Jasper
Lawler, head of research at LCG. "Investors are pinning their hopes on governments flooding
people and businesses with enough cash to survive months of a coronavirus-induced lockdown," he
adds.

Take a look at the STOXX 600 so far this morning:

(Joice Alves)

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BROAD GAINS BUT NO BREAK FOR TRAVEL & LEISURE (0825 GMT)

Stocks are still up, but gains not as strong as what we had expected ahead of the open. All
major sectors are gaining this morning, but the poor travel & leisure index is still not
able to catch a break.

Compass has spoiled the party falling 12% after the world's biggest catering firm
warned the virus could hit profits sharply.

On the bright side, Air France and Accor shares were up after France's
fiscal response last night.

As expected UK pub, cinema and restaurant stocks are taking a hit with Cineworld
and Whitbread leading the losses.

(Thyagaraju Adinarayan)

*****

ON OUR RADAR: PANDORA, DIXONS CARPHONE, UK PUBS & RESTAURANTS (0755 GMT)

We're still in positive territory and all's well at this point with bourses seen gaining 4%
to 5% at market open. There are bunch of corporate updates and, unsurprisingly, almost all of
them are related to coronavirus.

Jeweller Pandora has withdrawn its financial outlook citing the coronavirus
outbreak. VW said the spread of the virus made it impossible to give an outlook for 2020.

Mobile phone retailer Dixons Carphone to axe 2,900 jobs as it plans to close all UK
standalone Carphone Warehouse stores.

UK government's recommendation to avoid pubs, clubs, restaurants, cinemas and theatres could
hit Whitbread, Marston's, Cineworld, JD Weatherspoon and
Mitchells & Butlers.

In some good coronavirus news, Pfizer inked a deal with Germany's BioNTech to
co-develop a potential vaccine for the coronavirus using BioNTech's mRNA-based drug development
platform.

Meanwhile, short-selling bans have been imposed in several European countries. A tad too
late? Hedge fund behemoth Bridgewater roughly had $15 billion in bets against companies on the
continent and in Great Britain.

(Thyagaraju Adinarayan)

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TUESDAY LOOKS BRIGHT AFTER YET ANOTHER BLACK MONDAY (0715 GMT)

Stock futures point to a decent open for European stocks with 2% to 3% gains across the
board as governments impose movement restrictions to contain the spread of the virus and promise
billions of dollars to protect the economy.

French President Macron is imposing a lockdown today and has said the government will
protect companies from the risk of collapsing.

That kind of response is likely to stabilize fragile markets, ain't it?

"We believe that these measures will help the French economy to rebound quicker after the
deep recession now implied by Covid-19 and reach the third quarter with a limited number of
large bankruptcies and hence an unemployment rate far below what a recession of that magnitude
could have caused," ING economists say.

(Warning: We've have seen several early morning rallies recently which disappeared in thin
air by lunch time)

(Thyagaraju Adinarayan)

*****

FINGERS CROSSED: EUROPE SEEN 2% TO 3% HIGHER (0651 GMT)

European stocks are seen heading for a steady open with 2% to 3% gains after some extreme
moves in the last few days as investors believe there will be more fiscal response in the coming
days as the fast-spreading virus is seen bringing the world economy to a grinding halt.

"Central banks have done their best, but in the absence of significant fiscal measures from
politicians across the world, it is difficult to see where markets might find a possible base in
the medium term," Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets UK says.

Financial spreadbetters IG expect London's FTSE to open 75 points higher at 5,226,
Frankfurt's DAX to open 91 points higher at 8,834 and Paris' CAC to open 46 points higher at
3,927.

(Thyagaraju Adinarayan)

*****

(Reporting by Joice Alves, Julien Ponthus and Thyagaraju Adinarayan)