European stocks closed lower; Oil prices rally above $50 a barrel

European stocks closed under pressure on Thursday as investors eyed earnings and oil edged above $50 a barrel amid renewed hope OPEC members would be willing to cut its output.

The Pan-EuropeanSTOXX 600 (STOXX: .STOXX) index was 0.01 percent down after a choppy trading day. Major bourses and sectors were both mixed.

Meanwhile in the U.S., the Dow Jones industrial average was trading 0.02 percent up with the broader S&P 500 index trading 0.1 percent lower.

Deutsche Bank (XETRA: DBK-DE) saw its shares seesawing despite releasing better-than-expected revenues in the third quarter of this year. It began trading with shares rising as much as 3 percent, though retreated to 0.6 percent up at the close.

Barclays (London Stock Exchange: BARC-GB) was higher by 2 percent in early morning trade with the bank reporting a 35 percent rise in pretax profits for its third quarter. The bank ended Thursday's European trading day 4.8 percent up.

The industrial sector was the worst performing on Thursday, falling around 1.35 percent. The Swiss industrial group ABB (Swiss Exchange: ABBN-CH) was at the bottom of the Stoxx 600 (STOXX: .STOXX) for a large part of the day, after presenting a sharp decrease in orders , it went on to close 6.6 percent in the black.

Oil prices edged over the $50 a barrel threshold as the commodity drew support from a reported drop in US crude inventories and comments from OPEC gulf members. Reuters reported that energy ministers from Saudi Arabia and their gulf allies stated that they would be willing to reduce oil output by around 4 percent.

Meanwhile, new data showed the U.K. economy grew 0.5 percent quarter-on-quarter, beating estimates of 0.3 percent in a Reuters poll. The third quarter data helped sterling rise to a one-week high.

Elsewhere, the Swedish central bank announced Thursday it was keeping its repo rate unchanged at -0.5 percent. As a result, the Swedish Krona dropped against the euro from 9.7170 to 9.6800. The central bank also said that it dos not intent to rise rate until early 2018.

Meanwhile, the Norwegian central bank has also left its key rate unchanged at 0.5 percent. Norges bank reported that house prices and household debt have increased more-than-expected.

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