European stock markets ended a wildly volatile week firmly in positive territory as bid activity sprang back to life and banking stocks got a shot in the arm from the performance of their US peers.

Forecast-beating results from Citigroup yesterday came hot on the heels of strong results from JPMorgan a day earlier and underpinned a rally in battered banking stocks. The sector led the pan-European FTSE Eurofirst 300 up 1.6 per cent to close at 1,164.19. The index’s gains for the week stood at 3.4 per cent.