A roundup of trading on major world markets:
NEW YORK – Wall Street has closed higher, led by surging energy shares that were buttressed by rising oil prices, as investors scooped up equities at the start of corporate earnings season.
All 10 S&P sectors closed higher and the Dow industrials posted their best day in about a month.
Energy shares jumped 2.8 per cent, with oil majors Exxon Mobil and Chevron giving two of the biggest boosts to the S&P 500.
Financials, the worst performing group this year, rose 1.3 per cent.
JP Morgan was set to report results on Wednesday, followed by other banks later in the week.
S&P 500 profits are expected to have fallen 7.8 per cent in the first quarter, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S, but that low bar may make it easier for companies to post positive surprises.
“Because of lowered expectations, markets have a way of popping a little bit before the earnings set in,” said Peter Kenny, senior market strategist at Global Markets Advisory Group.
“It’s the lowered expectations that are really setting the framework for any sort of short-term rally.”
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 164.84 points, or 0.94 per cent, to 17,721.25, the S&P 500 gained 19.73 points, or 0.97 per cent, to 2,061.72 and the Nasdaq Composite added 38.69 points, or 0.8 per cent, to 4,872.09.
LONDON – UK shares have advanced in choppy trade, buoyed by a rally in the energy sector after oil prices rose on a report that Saudi Arabia and Russia had reached agreement on output restrictions.
The FTSE 350 Oil and Gas index ended 1.5 per cent higher on Tuesday, turning positive in the last two hours of trade.
Global oil prices hit fresh five-month highs, piercing $US44 a barrel and extending earlier gains after a report that top producers Russia and Saudi Arabia had agreed to freeze output ahead of a much-anticipated producers meeting on Sunday.
Miners also rose, led higher by a 9.1 per cent rise in Anglo American.
The company said rough diamond sales during the third cycle of the year continued a reasonably positive trend.
The mining sector was up four per cent, supported by steady copper prices and encouraging economic signals from China.
“Commodities have been rallying very strongly since about February … and that has obviously given miners a bit of a tailwind,” Ken Odeluga, market analyst at City Index, said.
The blue-chip FTSE 100 index was up 42.27 points, or 0.7 per cent at 6,242.39 points by the close.
HONG KONG – Asian markets have performed well with Japan’s Nikkei rising more than one per cent after a rally in the yen against the US dollar stalled following three weeks of consistent gains.
The Hang Seng index rose 0.3 per cent, to 20,504.44, while the China Enterprises Index gained 0.4 per cent, to 8,841.86 points.
Hong Kong shares drew some inspiration from the bullish stocks in Japan.
The blue-chip CSI300 index fell 0.4 per cent, to 3,218.45, while the Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.3 per cent, to 3,023.65 points.
The more robust performance of oil helped commodities-linked currencies like the Australian and New Zealand dollars, both up around half a per cent against their US equivalent.
The yen dipped 0.2 per cent to Y108.16 per US dollar.
“Oil prices holding above $US40 a barrel overnight has got the dollar on the back foot, more than anything else, so we have the yen and the dollar at the bottom, and everything else at the top,” said Societe Generale macro strategist Kit Juckes, in London.
“I think dollar/yen will get back to 120 at some point. We might want to sell it again there, but I think this move is way overdone.”
WELLINGTON – The S&P/NZX 50 Index gained 0.9 points, or 0.01 per cent, to 6726.02.
