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Oil plays and autos lift European shares

(Corrects to clarify Yara is fertilizer producer)

LONDON, April 12 (Reuters) - European shares rose on Wednesday, driven by gains in financials stocks and carmakers, as first-quarter earnings season kicked off and a rise in the oil price underpinned energy stocks.

The pan-European STOXX 600 index was up 0.6 percent by 0722 GMT. Britain's mid-caps hit a fresh record high at 19,412.43 points, up 0.5 percent.

Autos stocks were the best performers, up 1.5 percent, followed by oil and gas stocks which rose with crude prices on potential extension of output cuts.

German luxury carmaker Daimler (IOB: 0NXX.IL - news) gained 2 percent after it said first-quarter profits jumped 87 percent in a surprise release Tuesday evening, on strong Mercedes (Xetra: 710000 - news) sales.

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Dialog Semiconductor (LSE: 0OLN.L - news) fell for the second day, down 2.5 percent. It had closed down 14 percent on Tuesday after an analyst report said its biggest client Apple (NasdaqGS: AAPL - news) could be seeking to ditch it.

Peer Austria Microsystem meanwhile was among top gainers, up 4.8 percent.

Norwegian fertilizer maker Yara was a top gainer after Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS-PB - news) added the stock to its 'conviction list', raising it to a buy.

Banco Popular led gains among banks, up 3.6 percent having hit a fresh record low at the open. The struggling Spanish bank was down 18 percent since announcing it would raise more capital on Monday.

Britain's biggest retailer Tesco (Frankfurt: 852647 - news) fell 2.6 percent after posting forecast-beating full-year profit, saying it was continuing to engage with competition authorities to seek shareholder approval of its deal to buy wholesaler Booker . (Reporting by Helen Reid, Editing by Vikram Subhedar)