By Avinash P and Johann M Cherian

(Reuters) - European shares hit a record high on Thursday, with luxury and artificial intelligence hardware makers leading gains on positive earnings.

The pan-European STOXX 600 index (.STOXX) was up 0.5% at 624.67 points as of 0930 GMT, with France's CAC 40 index (.FCHI) and UK's FTSE 100 (.FTSE) also hitting record highs.

Investors globally were relieved that U.S. data on Wednesday reflected a broadly resilient jobs market, and in Europe, the focus was on a batch of better-than-expected earnings.

Since late January, European shares have recovered from several headwinds, including trade uncertainty stemming from a rift with the U.S. over Greenland, alongside a selloff in commodities and tech stocks.

Luxury stocks (.STXLUXP) led the index higher with a 1.5% gain, aided by France's Hermes (HRMS.PA) touching a near one-month high after another quarter of steady revenue growth, lifted by strong sales in the U.S. and Japan.

Meanwhile, AI-disruption worries that had plagued insurers, asset managers and software companies globally over the past few sessions appeared to take a backseat.

"While fears over AI disruption to the software sector have jolted investor sentiment over the past week, we see it as a validation of AI's monetisation potential," analysts at UBS said in a note.

Traders instead flocked to AI equipment makers in Europe.

Legrand shares jumped 5.8% after the French electrical and digital building infrastructure group said strong data centre demand was helping its expansion, supporting a slight increase in its medium-term profitability targets.

Engineering group Siemens (SIEGn.DE) also jumped 5.9% after raising its full-year profit outlook after first-quarter profit exceeded expectations, boosted by surging demand for AI-driven data centre infrastructure.

On the M&A front, money manager Schroders <SDR.L> shot up 28% after U.S. asset manager Nuveen (NIM.N) agreed to buy the UK company for 9.9 billion pounds ($13.5 billion), creating a

The broader financial services sector (.SXFP) jumped 1.3%.

On the flip side, Swedish biopharmaceutical firm Camurus (CAMX.ST) slid 17%, set for its biggest daily drop in over eight years, after reporting downbeat fourth-quarter revenue.

Dutch payments processor Adyen (ADYEN.AS) fell 16.3%, on track for its steepest one-day fall in over two years, after cautious guidance.

French drugmaker Sanofi (SASY.PA) fell 5% after abruptly ousting its CEO, Paul Hudson, underscoring rising pressure from U.S. vaccine headwinds and a stalled turnaround since he took the reins in 2019.

Reporting by Avinash P and Johann M Cherian in Bengaluru; Editing by Harikrishnan Nair

Reuters report

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