By Carla Mozee, MarketWatch

Stocks across Europe fell Thursday, deflated as a reported deal between debt-laden Greece and its creditors hasn't come through, the prospect of which sent shares soaring in the previous session.

The Stoxx Europe 600 gave up 0.4% to 407.40, with only the health-care, consumer-services and technology sectors advancing modestly.

On the country indexes, Germany's DAX 30 shed 0.1% to 11,762.80 after Wednesday's leap of 1.3%. Frances's CAC 40 gave up 0.5% at 5,155.39, and in London, the FTSE 100 was off fractionally at 7,033.19.

The Stoxx 600 on Wednesday popped up 1.3% (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/european-stocks-jump-on-reports-greece-nearing-a-debt-deal-2015-05-27), following comments from Greece's Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras that suggested Athens was in the final stretch of a deal on economic reforms with creditors.

But other key European officials late Wednesday rebuffed the suggestion, saying talks were still ongoing. International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde said in a TV interview that she "would not say that we already have reached substantial results," according to a Reuters report.

Greece, which is feared to be running out of cash, needs to cut a deal to unlock its next round of bailout funds. The country faces making a 1.5 billion-euro debt-service payment to the International Monetary Fund on June 5.

But the Athex Composite managed to swing out of the red and rise 0.1%, to 853.55. There, shares of Piraeus Bank SA climbed 3.8%, and Alpha Bank AE moved up 1.5%. Greek bond prices were also rose, sending the yield on 2-year debt down 47 basis points to 22.54%. The yield on 10-year debt was down 6 basis points at 10.96%. Prices and yields move inversely.

The euro (EURUSD) was able to remain higher against the dollar (DXY), at $1.0939, compared with $1.0905 late Wednesday in New York.

The euro's gain suggests "the market is increasingly confident that a deal will be struck," said Richard Perry, market analyst at Hantec Markets, in a Thursday note. The lack of retracement in the move "despite the denial of the European Commission that a deal was imminent, was also interesting and may well now be supportive for the euro, which has come under significant strain in recent days," he said.

Investors on Thursday were also assessing comments made by European Central Bank Governing Council member Ewald Nowotny. He told CNBC (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ecbs-nowotny-urges-caution-on-qe-exit-cnbc-2015-05-28) the central bank will have to be "very careful" when it eventually unwinds its quantitative-easing program. The ECB in March launched a EUR1.1 trillion bond-buying program, set to run to September 2016.

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