MILAN (Reuters) - Optimism over China-U.S. trade talks helped European shares steady near four-month highs on Thursday, although a number of poorly received updates from the likes of utility Centrica (LON:CNA), engineer Technip (PA:FTI) and shipper Moeller-Maersk weighed.
The pan-European STOXX 600 index was flat by 0830 GMT, while the trade-sensitive DAX index was up 0.3 percent and France's CAC 40 added 0.1 percent.
A Reuters report said Washington and Beijing had started to outline commitments on the stickiest issues in their trade dispute, marking the most significant progress yet toward ending a seven-month trade war.
Centrica was the biggest faller on the STOXX 600, down 11 percent after it warned a national price cap on energy bills would hit its 2019 results.
Moeller-Maersk fell 8.7 percent after meeting fourth-quarter expectations, while TechnipFMC also tumbled more than 7 percent as the oil services company posted a fourth quarter loss.
Prysmian was another heavy faller, down 9 percent, after the Italian cable maker said a system failure was detected in its Westernlink Interconnection.
Barclays (LON:BARC) rose 4 percent. Even though the UK bank reported a lower than forecast attributable profit, it did show signs of progress in its under-pressure investment bank, where profit for the full year increased as its equities trading unit saw income rise 25 percent.
Still in the UK, BAE Systems (LON:BAES) fell 5.9 percent. Britain's biggest defense company said German moves to block exports to Saudi Arabia could hit its major deals with the Kingdom.