LONDON (Reuters) - Europe's financial stocks wilted after a delayed vote on tax reform in the U.S. deflated a rally in the sector, driving regional benchmarks to start December with a dip.
Euro zone stocks (STOXXE) fell 0.6 percent while Britain's FTSE (FTSE), which has suffered from a strong sterling this week, slid 0.1 percent.
Financials were the biggest weight after the U.S. Senate delayed a vote on a tax reform bill that investors anticipate will be beneficial for banks.
Lloyds (L:LLOY), Barclays (L:BARC), and BNP Paribas (PA:BNPP) led the index down.
Oil and gas stocks stayed buoyant, with Shell (L:RDSa), Total (PA:TOTF) and BP (L:BP) leading sector gains as OPEC's extension of supply cuts continued to boost crude prices.
Healthcare stocks outperformed thanks to a Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) upgrade boosting UCB (BR:UCB) by 3.3 percent while Novo Nordisk (CO:NOVOb), flagged as one of the strategists' favorites in the pharma space, gained 2.8 percent.
British pharma company Indivior (L:INDV) also shot up 11.7 percent after its opioid addiction drug got approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Struggling French telecom company Altice (AS:ATCA) - whose shares sank 59 percent in November after disappointing results - rose 4.6 percent after the company said it would sell data center and Swiss telecoms businesses in a bid to reduce its 50 billion euro debt pile.
Meanwhile shares in Dialog Semiconductor (DE:DLGS), hammered on Thursday by a press report Apple (O:AAPL) would in-source its power chip design, removing a crucial supplier relationship for the German firm, recovered to trade up 4 percent.