Stocks across Europe had a killer day
Kacper Pempel/Reuters
Stocks began the day slowly, but gradually gained as the day progressed.
The day's biggest winner was Italy's FTSE MIB, which climbed 2.27% to close at 18,787 points, boosted by the country's largest lender, and the country's only globally systemically important bank, Unicredit.
Unicredit saw shares climb almost 16% after it announced that it is cutting 14,000 jobs and raising €13 billion (£11 billion) in a record share sale as part of a plan to streamline its business and restructure its balance sheet.
An even bigger winner in Italy on the day was media company Mediaset, which closed the day a huge 32% higher following news that the company is resisting a hostile takeover bid from French firm Vivendi.
Here's the index-wide chart:
Investing.com
The mood in Europe was dictated by the upcoming Federal Reserve meeting on Wednesday, when the Fed is expected to hike interest rates for the first time since the end of 2015, pushing its key interest rate up to 0.75%.
In Britain, stocks climbed after the latest inflation data was released by the Office for National Statistics. The ONS said that the UK's consumer price index - the key measure of inflation - was 1.2%, up from 0.9% in October, and ahead of the 1.1% forecasted by economists.
Core inflation figures, which strip out volatile goods like oil and food, rose to 1.4% in the month, up from 1.2% at the previous reading, and ahead of the predicted 1.3%.
The FTSE 100 ended the day 1.15% higher, boosted by a 4.2% gain from Rolls-Royce, along with a 3.9% pick-up from BT Group. Here's the FTSE's chart:
Investing.com
And here's how Europe as a whole shaped up:
Investing.com
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