"Our base case is for prolonged economic weakness and financial market strains in periphery countries, spilling over into renewed recession for the euro area as a whole this year and the next” said Citi

It will be a very busy day for corporate earnings in Europe with ABB already reporting in Zurich. The engineering giant missed expectations for the second quarter due to a strong Swiss Franc but predicted better times ahead due to positive developments in the Chinese and US markets.

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