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Investing.com - Shares of European arms makers and defense firms slipped for a second straight session on Monday, as the United States and Ukraine held ongoing negotiations over a potential peace plan to end the latter’s war with Russia.
An index of these companies edged down to its lowest level since late August, after having slumped by 3.4% on Friday. The decline brought the index down to largest weekly loss since March.
Among individual stocks, Rheinmetall fell, as well as German names Renk and Hensoldt. Leonardo in Italy, France’s Thales, and Sweden’s Saab also decreased.
Despite the drop in these stocks, the pan-European Stoxx 600 had edged up by 0.2% by 05:21 ET (10:21 GMT).
Both the U.S. and Ukraine said on Sunday they would make changes to an initial peace proposal put forward by U.S. President Donald Trump, which critics have claimed was too favorable for Russia.
Trump previously urged Ukraine to sign on to the peace plan by Thanksgiving later this week, but U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has suggested the deadline was not unmovable. In a joint statement unveiled on Sunday, delegations from the U.S. and Ukraine called their discussions "highly productive," although no further specifics were provided.
Rubio added that a list of issues regarding Trump’s 28-point peace proposal, which includes a promise by Ukraine to cede territory to Russia and vow not to join the NATO alliance, had been whittled down. Ukrainian officials also moved to offer statements of thanks to Trump, who had earlier accused Kyiv of being ungrateful for American support.
Meanwhile, European officials, who have been backing Ukraine, joined the negotiations after they released a modified version of Trump’s plan which would both moot territorial concessions and push back on possible limits to the size of Kyiv’s military forces.
(Reuters contributed reporting.)