European Stocks Slide for Third Week as BHP, Insurers Retreat

European stocks posted their third week of losses as Spain and Greece suffered ratings downgrades and Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi used planes to attack rebels, adding to concern that the global economic recovery will falter.

BHP Billiton Ltd. led raw-material shares to the biggest decline among 19 industry groups on the Stoxx Europe 600 Index as a report showed export growth slowed in China, the world’s biggest consumer of commodities. Swiss Reinsurance Co. and Munich Re paced a selloff in insurers after Japan’s biggest earthquake on record.

The Stoxx 600 declined 2.3 percent to 275.42 this past week. The benchmark gauge has lost more than 5 percent since reaching a 2 1/2-year high on Feb. 17 as crude oil surged amid fighting between Libyan rebels and forces loyal to their ruler for the last 41 years, Qaddafi.

“To say that market sentiment has turned negative this week would be something of an understatement,” said London- based Howard Wheeldon, a senior strategist at BGC Partners. There is “renewed expression of doubt by markets as to where, on the back of the oil price and Middle East contagion, the global economy goes from here. Adding to market woes has been the sizable earthquake in Japan.”

National benchmark indexes fell in 17 of the 18 western Europe markets this week as Moody’s Investors Service cut Spain’s credit rating to Aa2 and lowered Greece’s government bond rating to B1. France’s CAC 40 Index dropped 2.3 percent, the U.K.’s FTSE 100 Index sank 2.7 percent, Germany’s DAX Index lost 2.8 percent and Spain’s IBEX 35 gauge slid 1 percent. Greece’s ASE Index advanced less than 0.1 percent. (Bloomerg)