The main Spanish stock market index extended its upward streak on Monday to fourteen-month highs, in a context of monetary optimism in view of the signs of remission of inflation, the fall in energy prices and the easing of restrictions due to COVID-19 in China.

In a global context of holiday closures in several of the main Asian markets, markets are awaiting the PMI indices for the Eurozone and the United States, which on Tuesday could show less pronounced declines than in the previous month.

While awaiting more corporate results and the upcoming monetary policy decisions of the Federal Reserve (February 1) and the European Central Bank (February 2), which are expected to raise 25 and 50 basis points respectively, equities maintain the upward trend with which they have started the year.

"The market is still quite buoyant at the moment," said Peter Chatwell, head of global macro trading strategies at Mizuho, who pointed to the idea that US inflation has peaked as a driver of the rallies.

"I remain cautious about the inflation outlook for the second half of the year," he said, however.

That being the case, Spain's selective Ibex-35 stock market closed up 25.90 points on Monday, up 0.29%, to 8,944.10 points, its highest level since November 17, 2021.

The FTSE Eurofirst 300 index of large European stocks rose by 0.54%.

In the banking sector, Santander lost 0.05%, BBVA scored 1.30%, Caixabank advanced 0.10%, Sabadell gained 1.01%, Bankinter dropped 0.53% and Unicaja Banco lost 0.08%.

Among the large non-financial stocks, Telefónica gained 0.42%, Inditex advanced 0.40%, Iberdrola gained 0.09%, Cellnex fell 0.60%, and the oil company Repsol rose 1.14%.

(Information by Dario Fernandez; additional information by Elizabeth Howcroft)