Several pieces of good news saw the European markets turning around in mid-afternoon trading on Tuesday.

The FTSE Eurofirst 300 was up to 1072.7, up by 0.9 percent. In Paris, the CAC-40 had risen 0.5 percent to 3,971.05, and in Frankfurt, the Xetra Dax was up 0.4 percent to 4,218.70.

Among that good news was a better performance on Wall Street, positive earnings reports from the pharmaceuticals sector, and a good earnings report from Texas Instruments that stimulated the technology sector.

Roche, the Swiss pharmaceuticals company posted a 17 percent gain in its first quarter, mostly on the strength of sales of their cancer and flu drugs. This was much better than had been expected.

Additionally, Akzo Nobel, the Dutch chemicals and drug group reported that their first-quarter earnings had met expectations.

The technology sector improved, with Infinion up by 1 percent, STMicroelectronics 1.3 percent higher , and an advance of 1.1 percent by ASML.