* FTSEurofirst 300 rises 1 pct, ending a 3-day losing run
* Banks leading the gainers
* BoE hold rates, QE programme
* For up-to-the-minute market news, click on []
By Dominic Lau
LONDON, Dec 10 (Reuters) - European shares snapped their
three-day losing streak on Thursday, helped by banks recovering
from recent losses on worries over some of the region's more
exposed economies and Dubai's debt problems.
The FTSEurofirst 300 <> index of top European shares
closed up 1 percent at 1,004.90 points, after losing 3 percent
in the pervious three sessions.
"We are not quite back at the safe zone yet. It is
encouraging that it's rallying but we need to cross over some of
the key levels," said Geoff Wilkinson, head of investment
research at Mint Securities in London.
Wilkinson said if the index failed to break through the
resistance levels, "anybody who didn't sell in the first time
tends to come in and sell the second time. That's what we are
thinking in the market here."
Banks were the top gainers, with HSBC <HSBA.L>, Barclays
<BARC.L>, Royal Bank of Scotland <RBS.L>, Lloyds <LLOY.L>,
Credit Agricole <CAGR.PA> and UBS <UBSN.VX> up 2 to 6.5 percent.
Dubai's shares <> rebounded 7 percent, their largest
one-day percentage gain for 41 weeks.
However, industry sources said British banks had not struck
a deal to reschedule Dubai World's debts, denying a newspaper
report that the lenders had reached an agreement with the
troubled state conglomerate. []
Greek banks <.FTATBNK> also recovered after Fitch Ratings
cut Greece's credit rating this week while Standard & Poor's
said it may lower the country's rating. National Bank of Greece
<NBGr.AT>, Alpha Bank <ACBr.AT> and EFG Eurobank <EFGr.AT>
advanced 6.8 to 7.8 percent.
Across Europe, Britain's FTSE 100 <> was up 0.8
percent. The Bank of England left its asset purchase programme
intact at 200 billion pounds ($325 billion) and held interest
rates at 0.5 percent, as widely expected.
Both Germany's DAX <> and France's CAC 40 <>
advanced 1.1 percent.
Volumes on the FTSEurofirst 300 were about 94 percent of its
90-day daily average volume.
The pan-European index has rallied 56 percent since hitting
a floor in early March, and is up 21 percent this year.
MARKET TO REMAIN VOLATILE
The FTSEurofirst 300 has traded in a broad range of
959.65-1,036.39 points in the past three months and has closed
in positive and negative territory almost an equal number of
times.
"The market will remain volatile until the end of the year,"
said Luc Van Hecka, chief economist at KBC Securities.
"Most of the major long-term investors have already closed
their books for the rest of the year. The market is really in
the hands of traders."
The number of U.S. workers filing new claims for jobless
benefits rose more than expected last week, pushed up by layoffs
in seasonal industries, indicating improvement in the labour
market would be only gradual.
Miners were one of the main drags on the pan-European index,
with Rio Tinto <RIO.L>, Xstrata <XTA.L>, Lonmin <LMI.L> and
Antofagasta <ANTO.L> down 0.2 to 2.1 percent.
Among the individual movers in Europe, Inditex <ITX.MC>,
rose 3.6 percent after Europe's biggest clothing retailer and
owner of the Zara chain beat nine-month net profit forecasts,
helped by growth in Asia, and saying sales had picked up heading
into the key Christmas period.
Rival Hennes & Mauritz <HMb.ST> added 0.7 percent.
GlaxoSmithKline <GSK.L> put on 1.4 percent. The drugmaker's
head of emerging markets, Abbas Hussain, said the company can
outgrow its rival in emerging markets, the new battleground for
the world's top pharmaceutical companies as sales stall in
Western markets.
(Additional reporting by Atul Prakash; Editing by Sharon
Lindores)
