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EUROPE-MARKETS
Global equities mostly climb as dealers await trade talks news
LONDON, Feb 23, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – World stock markets advanced Friday as
investors awaited what they hoped will be encouraging news from US-China
trade talks in Washington, dealers said.
Europe’s key equity markets were modestly higher at the close, building on
earlier Asian gains.
Wall Street was also higher in the late New York morning as US economic
concerns appeared to be eclipsed by hopes that high-level talks between the
United States and China will seal a trade war truce.
“Global equities saw some modest gains… as investors await results from
the Sino-US trade talks,” said Oanda analyst Dean Popplewell.
“Will we get some concrete news or perhaps an announcement of an extension
of the March 1 deadline for implementing further US tariffs?”
And with the March deadline approaching, US President Donald Trump will
meet with China’s top negotiator and Xi Jinping’s top economics envoy, Liu
He, on Friday.
“The market will continue to look for a memorandum of understanding
between the two nations, a date and place of a potential summit between
President Trump and China’s President Xi, and an announcement if the March 1
deadline will be delayed,” Briefing.com analysts wrote.
– No ‘meaningful’ deal? –
The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) meanwhile forecast that the two
sides would make “some progress” — but were unlikely to clinch any
“meaningful” deal.
“The likelihood that the US and China will make some progress in the
ongoing trade talks has increased as a result of mounting domestic pressure
in both economies,” noted EIU global economist Cailin Birch in a report.
“Nonetheless, we do not expect a meaningful agreement, as the US and China
enter into a strategic competition for economic — and particularly
technological — dominance.”
The EIU added that any deal would therefore only provide “temporary
relief” from trade tensions.
Investors later Friday will be digesting remarks from several top Federal
Reserve officials and a semi-annual Fed report on monetary policy.
BSS/AFP/HR/1000