Europe: Stocks head lower on Evergrande woes, mixed earnings

[BENGALURU] European shares slipped on Thursday, driven by gloomy sentiment on renewed worries around China's property sector and mixed quarterly results.

The pan-European Stoxx 600 index edged down 0.4 per cent by 7.10 am GMT, retreating from its highest level in 6 weeks. Asian stocks were knocked lower by news about the collapse of a US$2.6 billion asset sale at heavily indebted developer China Evergrande Group.

The losses were led by miners, automakers and industrial stocks, in tandem with growing nervousness around a slate of corporate earnings set for Thursday and the weeks to follow.

Swiss engineering and tech group ABB fell 3.4 per cent on lowering its full-year sales forecast after warning of shortages of components.

AB Volvo was down 2.1 per cent after its profit beat expectations but warned that persisting chip shortages hampered the truck maker's production.

Barclays slipped 0.6 per cent even as the British bank posted a bumper third-quarter performance.

Unilever rose 1.2 per cent as the consumer goods giant beat third-quarter sales growth forecasts as it hiked prices to try to offset surging energy and other costs.

REUTERS