BLBG:Stocks, Euro Gain Before Crisis Talks; Commodities Rally
Stocks rose around the world, the euro strengthened and commodities headed for a bull market on mounting speculation leaders will make progress on Greece’s debt crisis at meetings this week. Irish benchmark yields fell to the lowest level since October 2010.
The MSCI All-Country World Index (SPX) added 0.3 percent at 7:20 a.m. in New York. Emerging-market stocks advanced the most in a week after China injected record funds into its banking system. Standard & Poor’s 500 Index futures jumped 0.2 percent. The euro appreciated 0.6 percent to $1.2417. Ireland’s nine-year bond yield fell as much as five basis points to 5.99 percent. The S&P GSCI gauge of 24 raw materials climbed 0.6 percent as soybeans rallied to a record and oil rose 0.6 percent in New York.
“We’ve got enough noises coming out of governments and central banks to suggest they are going to do something, they just need to figure out how to do it,” Karen Olney, head of thematic equity strategy at UBS AG, told Francine Lacqua on Bloomberg Television’s “On the Move” in London. “Asset allocators are saying it’s time to maybe reduce our underweight in European equities.”
Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, the head of the euro group of finance ministers, visits Greece tomorrow. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande meet in Berlin on Aug. 23, before holding separate talks with Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras later in the week. International creditors may adjust the interest on Greek bailout loans, Norbert Barthle, a senior lawmaker of Merkel’s party, was quoted as saying by the Passauer Neue Presse.
“The odds have increased that the Europeans will craft some kind of devil’s bargain,” Michael Shaoul, chairman of Marketfield Asset Management, which oversees about $2.7 billion in New York, said in a Bloomberg Television interview. “At the same time that that’s going on, U.S. economic data’s been a lot better.”
Julius Baer Offer
The Stoxx Europe 600 Index (SXXP) climbed 0.3 percent as gauges of mining companies and carmakers rallied. Julius Baer Group Ltd. added 2 percent as the wealth manager founded in 1890 reduced its rights offer to 500 million Swiss francs ($516 million) from 750 million francs. Straumann Holding AG (STMN) tumbled 13 percent, the most since October 2008, after the world’s biggest maker of dental implants reported first-half profit that fell short of analysts’ estimates.
The gain in U.S. futures indicated the S&P 500 will advance after closing yesterday within a point of a four-year high set in April.
The euro appreciated against 12 of its 16 major peers, advancing 0.6 percent versus the yen. Japan’s currency weakened against its main counterparts.
German Bonds
German 10-year bonds fell a second day, pushing the yield five basis points higher to 1.55 percent. The rate on similar- maturity Treasuries rose two basis points to 1.83 percent.
Spain’s two-year note yield fell for a sixth day, with the yield dropping 11 basis points as the government sold 4.51 billion euros ($5.6 billion) of bills, meeting its maximum target. Portuguese 10-year bonds advanced, pushing the yield down as much as 21 basis points to 9.40 percent, the lowest since May 2011.
Corn, wheat and Brent crude have led the GSCI commodities gauge rally from the closing low on June 21, surpassing the 20 percent threshold that signals a bull market. Soybeans gained 1.4 percent today. Copper advanced 1 percent after China’s imports last month were higher than a year earlier. It’s the biggest user of the metal. Oil in New York climbed as much as 0.8 percent to $96.76 a barrel, the highest since May 11.
The MSCI Emerging Markets Index rose 0.7 percent, the most in more than a week. The Shanghai Composite Index gained 0.5 percent. The People’s Bank of China conducted 220 billion yuan ($34.6 billion) of reverse-repurchase operations, the most in a single day, according to a trader at a primary dealer required to bid at the auctions. Benchmark gauges in Russia, India, Poland and Taiwan gained at least 1 percent.
To contact the reporter on this story: Stephen Kirkland in London at skirkland@bloomberg.net; Glenys Sim in Singapore at gsim4@bloomberg.net;
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stuart Wallace at Swallace6@bloomberg.net
