BRUSSELS/FRANKFURT/PARIS (dpa-AFX) - German stocks advanced on Thursday as
the Swiss National Bank delivered another interest rate cut, reducing its policy
rate by 25 basis points to 1.25 percent, as expected by two-thirds of analysts.

Elsewhere, Norway's central bank held its key policy rate at 4.5 percent as
expected.
The Bank of England will announce its monetary policy decision later today, with
no change in rates expected despite inflation hitting the 2 percent target in
May.

Closer home, Germany's producer prices continued to fall in May, though at the
weakest pace in the current sequence of decreases, which began in July last
year, data from Destatis revealed.

Producer prices decreased 2.2 percent on a yearly basis in May, slower than the
3.3 percent fall in April. Economists had forecast an annual fall of 2.0
percent.

On a monthly basis, producer prices remained unchanged versus a 0.2 percent
increase in April. Prices were expected to rise by 0.3 percent.

The benchmark DAX was up 91 points, or half a percent, at 18,158 after falling
0.4 percent in the previous session.

Automakers traded mostly higher, with Volkswagen rising 1 percent and Mercedes
Benz adding half a percent.

Europe's new car registrations declined in May due to a notable contraction in
the electric car sales, data from the European Automobile Manufacturers'
Association showed.

Overall car sales posted an annual decrease of 3.0 percent in May, reversing a
sharp 13.7 percent increase in April.

MorphoSys climbed 1 percent after it has entered into a delisting agreement with
Novartis BidCo AG and Novartis AG upon closing the acquisition by Novartis in
May this year.

Nordex, a provider of wind turbine systems, gained 1.3 percent on securing
orders for about 172 MW from various customers.



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