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European shares fall, hit by weak earnings and banks

Thu, 28th Jan 2016 12:39

* Pan-European falls 0.3 pct, down 7 pct year-to-date

* Roche lower after results miss expectations

* Oil stocks higher as crude steadies above $33 (Adds quotes, detail, recasts)

By Alistair Smout and Danilo Masoni

LONDON/MILAN, Jan 28 (Reuters) - European shares fell onThursday as disappointing earnings from Roche weighedon the healthcare sector and euro zone banks also cameunder pressure.

By 1200 GMT, the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index was 1.3 percent lower at 1,323.96 points, while the eurozone's blue chip Eurostoxx 50 index also fell, down1.5 percent.

Roche dropped 4 percent after 2015 net profit from Swissdrug maker fell short of expectations in 2015 and the company'sforecast of an improvement this year met a sceptical marketresponse. Its dividend also disappointed.

Analysts at Deutsche Bank said Roche had been weighed downby its diagnostics business, high tax and foreign exchangeeffects. It however reiterated its buy rating on the stocksaying underlying results were of good quality.

"There are big FX headwinds from last year which arefiltering through now... and that's going to be the trend forSwiss drugmakers and for Swiss stocks more generally," said JoeRundle, head of trading at ETX Capital.

Fellow pharmaceutical firm Novartis fell 3.3percent after many target price cuts from brokers following itsown disappointing results on Wednesday.

Euro zone banks were down 3.5 percent, with several Italianlenders being suspended "limit down" for the second time in asmany days.

An EU scheme to help Italy's banks offload billions of eurosof bad loans has been greeted with falls in the sector sinceWednesday. The deal is a complex compromise, and could see thebanks take significant losses on the debt.

"Europe is seven years behind the curve when it comes tosorting out the bad bank issues, which is why Europe hasn'trecovered," ETX Capital's Rundle said.

"There's a realisation that while the issues are being dealtwith, there are a range of further measures that will need to betaken."

Fashion firm H&M fell 4.2 percent after the fashionfirm warned that price reductions to help shift large stocks ofwinter wear after unusually warm weather and a strong dollarwould weigh on its first quarter.

Among the gainers, Electrolux added 3.9 percent,despite reporting a fourth quarter loss, with traders citing a better than expected underlying performance.

Investors were also digesting the latest update from theU.S. Federal Reserve, which kept rates unchanged on Wednesdaysaying it was "closely monitoring" global economic and financialdevelopments, signaling it wasn't ready to abandon a plan totighten monetary policy this year.

"The Fed was very pragmatic by showing it is ready toevaluate the impact of markets and delaying any decision toMarch," said Marco Vailati, head of research at Cassa Lombarda.

Today's European research round-up RCH/EUROPE (Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

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