LONDON (ShareCast) - (ShareCast News) - European stocks started the trading session on the front foot with the previous day's intense buying pressure carrying through into Tuesday, as investors monitor political developments in France and ahead of the European Central Bank's policy meeting later in the week.
As of 08:09 GMT the benchmark Stoxx 600 is up by 0.10% to 386.53, alongside gains of 0.12% for Germany's Dax to 12,470.88 and a rise of 0.07% for the Cac-40 to reach 5,272.91.

Acting as a backdrop, in the previous session the White House announced it would publish the outlines of its tax cut plans on Wednesday. The Trump administration wants to slash the corporate tax rate from 35% at present to 15%, the Wall Street Journal reports, prioritising economic growth over deficit concerns.

At the weekend, French centrist presidential candidate Emmmanuel Macron made off with the most votes, 24%, in the first round of voting, with all polls indicating that he will win the run-off vote on 7 May by a wide margin.

Nevertheless, some analysts are cautioning that nothing must be taken for granted - even if he wins.

Commenting on the situation in the euro area's second largest economy and one of its two key founding partners, Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets said: "in the absence of any political party backing of his own, [he will] have to create some form of consensus on both sides of the political divide that he has done so much to disrupt, in order to forge ahead with his own brand of reform.

"That will be no mean task in a country that has a labour code that is a bigger read than the bible, and whose vested interests are notoriously resistant to any type of reform."

Overnight, Macron's rival, far-right leader Marine Le Pen stepped down as head of the National Front party, claiming that it would "free" her to unite the French people ahead of the run-off vote.

Business confidence in France was steady in April amid improved conditions in the factory sector, offset by a slip in service sector confidence.

INSEE's headline business confidence index was unchanged in April from the month before at 104.0 and in-line with economists' forecasts.

Still on the economic calendar for Tuesday, at 0900 GMT the ECB will release the results of its quarterly Bank Lending Survey.

That will be followed by US data on home price growth and new home sales at 14:00 GMT and 15:00 GMT, respectively.

German software designer SAP is moving lower after reporting that core profits were slightly lower-than-expected over the first three months of the year.

French technology outfit Atos is increasing its goal for operating margins in 2017 to roughly 10%, having posted a 2% rise in first quarter sales to reach €3.1bn.

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