European shares pushed higher yesterday in holiday-thinned trading with shares in car manufacturers leading the way, despite a sharp drop in Tokyo as a surging yen hit exporters. 
“European equities are trading mostly higher in afternoon action, though volume is lighter than usual with UK markets closed for a holiday,” said market analysts at Charles Schwab. 
Germany’s DAX 30 ended the day up 0.8%, while France’s CAC 40 rose 0.3%. 
“Automakers are moving higher to help buoy the markets, aided by upbeat comments from Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV’s chairman (Sergio Marchionne) on the outlook for China,” said a note from the brokerage house. 
Fiat shares got a bump early on, but ended the day down 0.5% in Milan. 
However in Germany shares in Mercedes-maker Daimler rose 0.7% and BMW climbed 0.8%, with VW managing a 0.2% gain. 
“However, Italian banking stocks are hamstringing the financial sector after a disappointing banking stock initial public offering (IPO) in the nation,” said Charles Schwab analysts. 
Milan closed down 1% after investors were not seduced by an initial public offering by Banca Popolare di Vicenza, hitting other banking shares, including sector leaders Unicredit, which fell by 6.9% and Intesa Sanpaolo, which shed 3.4%. 
Wall Street was also higher approaching midday despite a key manufacturing report issued yesterday showed the sector slowed much more than expected in April. The Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing PMI index fell to 50.8 from 51.8 in March, nearing the no-growth level. 
The report kicked off of a week of heavy of big US economic data releases that includes April jobs and car sales data. 
After the ISM report the dollar fell against the euro. 
“The euro-dollar rate crossed a major technical level of $1.15 which opens up the possibility for a much higher increase,” said analyst Sylvain Loganadin at FXCM brokerage. 
“In effect, traders are positioning themselves for the publication of disappointing US non-farm payrolls data on Friday,” he added. 
Data released last week showed growth in the US economy had unexpectedly slowed to a 0.5% annual rate in the first quarter of this year.