U.S. stock futures stable; earnings season kicks into top gear
* Sterling up against the U.S. dollar
* Oil falls
* Benchmark 10-year yields up
(Updates with early U.S. markets activity, changes dateline,
previous LONDON)
By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK, Oct 21 (Reuters) - Shares on world stock indexes
mostly rose on Monday, as hopes for resolving the U.S.-China
trade war pushed investors toward riskier assets, while the
pound was near a 5-1/2-month high.
The British parliament's speaker refused to allow a vote on
Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Brexit divorce deal, suggesting
Johnson faces further problems in the Brexit ratification.
Johnson was hit in parliament on Saturday by opponents who
demanded a change to the sequencing of the ratification of the
deal, exposing the prime minister to a law that forced him to
request a delay until Jan. 31.
MSCI's world equity index .MIWD00000PUS , which tracks
shares in 47 countries, gained 0.6%. The Euro STOXX 600 .STOXX
added 0.7%, while the S&P 500 .SPX index was up 0.5%.
Investors in Asia earlier were boosted by comments on Friday
by Chinese Vice Premier Liu He that Beijing will collaborate
with the United States to address mutual concerns on the trade
war. U.S. President Donald Trump had also struck an optimistic
tone on Friday, saying he thought a trade deal would be signed
before an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Chile
next month. "Any kind of positive development on trade just gets people
a little excited, although it is too optimistic to believe that
they will reach a whole trade deal as early as mid-November,"
said Robert Pavlik, chief investment strategist at SlateStone
Wealth LLC in New York.
The 2020 U.S. presidential election was also influencing the
talks, investors said, with Trump looking to avoid the
possibility of tariffs imposed by China hurting his voters.
Stocks investors are also gearing up for high-profile
earnings reports this week from such companies as Microsoft Corp
MSFT.O and Amazon.com Inc. AMZN.O
On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose
23 points, or 0.09%, to 26,793.2, the S&P 500 .SPX gained
15.29 points, or 0.51%, to 3,001.49 and the Nasdaq Composite
.IXIC added 60.40 points, or 0.75%, to 8,149.95.
The dollar was heading toward its worst month since January
2018 amid sterling's gain.
Against the dollar, sterling GBP= was last up 0.1% in
North American trade, having earlier broken above $1.30 for the
first time in 5-1/2 months. The euro was 0.18% higher against
the dollar EUR= , having also been lifted by Brexit optimism
this month by 2.23%. In the U.S. bond market, benchmark 10-year notes US10YT=RR
last fell 11/32 in price to yield 1.787%, from 1.75% late on
Friday. In commodities, U.S. crude CLcv1 fell 1.1% to $53.19 per
barrel and Brent LCOcv1 was last at $58.60, down 1.38% on the
For Reuters Live Markets blog on European and UK stock
markets, click on: LIVE/
World FX rates in 2019 http://tmsnrt.rs/2egbfVh
MSCI All Country Wolrd Index Market Cap http://tmsnrt.rs/2EmTD6j
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