* Energy stocks plunge to their lowest in April
* British mid-caps lead declines on dire economic view
* ASML Holding, TomTom slide on weak earnings reports
* French shares fall as virus death toll crosses 15,000
(Adds comments, updates prices to close)
By Shreyashi Sanyal
April 15 (Reuters) - European shares closed firmly in the
red on Wednesday, ending a five-day rally as the first batch of
earnings reports underlined the business damage from the
coronavirus pandemic, while energy stocks sank on worries of a
plunge in oil demand.
Declines for Total SA, Royal Dutch Shell Plc
and BP Plc sent the European energy index
to its lowest point this month as oil prices were hit by
forecasts of global demand crumbling to its worst levels in a
quarter of a century.
The pan-European STOXX 600 index slipped 3.3%,
after having risen almost 8% since April 6 on early signs the
health crisis was ebbing and on hopes that sweeping lockdown
measures would soon be lifted.
The benchmark index has recovered about 22% since hitting an
eight-year low in March, but is still down almost 26% from a
record high hit in mid-February, and analysts warned an uptick
in coronavirus cases could spark another sell-off.
"Much of the ground that European equities have made since
mid-March was fuelled by rescue schemes and, more recently, the
levelling-off of the rate of infections, but traders are facing
up to the prospect of a painful economic downturn," said David
Madden, market analyst at CMC Markets in London.
U.S. majors JPMorgan Chase & Co and Johnson and
Johnson kicked off the first-quarter earnings season on
Tuesday with glum forecasts for 2020 as the pandemic crushed
business activity and erased liquidity.
ASML Holding NV, a key European supplier to
chipmakers such as Samsung and Intel, fell 3.2% after reporting
worse-than-expected earnings on Wednesday.
Dutch navigation and digital mapping company TomTom
shed 4.9% after saying it expected negative free cash
flow this year and lower revenue from its automotive and
consumer businesses.
Overall, analysts expect earnings for STOXX 600 firms to
slide 22% in the first quarter and 34.2% in the second,
deepening a corporate recession even as some economies consider
lifting strict stay-at-home orders.
"It is too early for governments to re-open their economies
and if they do so, it must be a slow procedure in order to avoid
a new flare up," said Charalambos Pissouros, a market analyst at
JFD Group.
French shares fell 3.8% as France became the fourth
country to report more than 15,000 deaths due to the coronavirus
after Italy, Spain and the United States.
Britain's domestically focused mid-cap index slumped
another 4.6% on signs the country was heading for a longer
lockdown and forecasts the economy could be facing its deepest
recession in 300 years.
(Reporting by Shreyashi Sanyal and Sagarika Jaisinghani in
Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur and Pravin Char)
BP (BP.)
