12:08 PM EST, 03/07/2025 (MT Newswires) -- The European stock markets closed mostly lower in Friday trading as The Stoxx Europe 600 was down 0.38%, Germany's DAX tumbled 1.79%, the FTSE 100 in London was off 0.03%, France's CAC 40 dropped 0.94%, while the Swiss Market Index rose 0.36%.

Seasonally adjusted GDP rose 0.2% in Q4 in the euro area and 0.4% in the EU, compared with Q3, according to Eurostat, the statistical office of the EU. Compared with a year earlier, seasonally adjusted GDP increased 1.2% in the euro area and 1.4% in the EU. For full year 2024, GDP increased 0.9% in the euro area and 1.0% in the EU.

In Germany, price-adjusted incoming orders in the manufacturing sector were down 7% in January compared with December, according to preliminary data from the Federal Statistical Office.

In the UK, the average house price edged 0.1% lower in February from January, according to the Halifax House Price Index. Annual growth also was unchanged at 2.9%, with the average house price declining by just 213 pounds ($275) to 298,602 pounds. Analysts had been expecting 3.1%, according to Bloomberg.

And in corporate news, AstraZeneca said Friday that results from a phase 3 trial of Imfinzi in combination with standard-of-care chemotherapy to treat certain gastric cancers met the primary endpoint of event-free survival. AstraZeneca also said that for the secondary endpoint of overall survival, a "strong trend" was seen in the interim analysis that favors the Imfinzi-based regimen.

Italian oil and gas company Eni has received non-binding offers for a minority stake in its carbon capture and storage unit from five parties, Reuters reported Thursday, citing sources with knowledge of the matter. Eni, HitecVision, and Snam declined to comment when contacted by MT Newswires while Global Infrastructure Partners, Macquarie, and PTTEP did not respond to a request for comment.

Lloyds Banking Group is hiring hundreds of IT engineers in India while cutting a similar number of jobs in the UK, the Financial Times reported on Friday, citing a person familiar with the matter. The financial services company expects to add 4,000 permanent tech and data employees in India by the end of the year, according to the report. Lloyds Banking did not immediately respond to a request for comment from MT Newswires.