Global Markets Mostly Higher Ahead of Data-Heavy Week

BEIJING (AP) —
Currency traders watch monitors at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Monday. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Global stock markets rose Monday as investors looked ahead to a crowded week of corporate earnings, a possible U.S. interest-rate cut and other potentially market-moving events.

Frankfurt, Shanghai and Tokyo advanced while London opened lower as fears about U.S.-Chinese trade tension and Brexit receded.

Markets shrugged off soft earnings from Boeing, Caterpillar and other U.S. companies. Another 160 report this week, including Alphabet, Apple, Facebook, General Electric and Exxon Mobil.

The Federal Reserve is expected to cut interest rates again. Central banks in Japan and Canada also are due to announce interest-rate decisions.

The U.S. Treasury is due to report which governments it deems are manipulating their currencies to boost exports, a designation that can trigger penalties. A watch list issued in May included China, Japan and Germany.

This will be “one of the most substantial data and event risk weeks of the year,” Jeffrey Halley of Oanda said in a report. “Stock markets and energy will likely be punished should earnings or data from the U.S. or China disappoint.”

Early Monday, Germany’s DAX gained 0.1% to 12,901.45 and France’s CAC 40 lost 5 points to 5,716.91. London’s FTSE 100 shed 0.4% to 7,297.70.

On Wall Street, futures for the benchmark Standard & Poor’s 500 index and the Dow Jones Industrial Average were up 0.2%.

In Asian trading, the Shanghai Composite Index closed up 0.8% at 2,980.05 and Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 gained 0.3% to 22,867.27. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 0.8% to 26,891.26.

South Korea’s Kospi was up 0.3% at 2,093.60 and Australia’s S&P-ASX 200 rose 1 point to 6,740.70. Taiwan advanced while markets in New Zealand, Singapore and India were closed for holidays.

On Friday, the S&P 500 closed within 0.1% of its all-time high on July 26. The S&P 500 rose 0.4% to 3,022.55 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.6% to 26,958.06. The Nasdaq climbed 0.7% to 8,243.12.

Investor attention shifted to corporate earnings as tension eased after Washington and Beijing resumed negotiations.

Both sides have imposed tariffs on billions of dollars of each other’s goods. The 15-month-old conflict has battered factories and farmers on both sides and spurred fears that the global economy might tip into recession.

On Monday, Vice President Mike Pence is due to deliver a speech on U.S.-China relations amid tension over protests in Hong Kong.

Investors expect the Fed to cut its benchmark rate by 0.25% following signs of U.S. economic weakness.

Also, markets are watching a monthly Chinese manufacturing indicator due out Friday for signs of whether economic growth is weakening further after slowing to a three-decade low in the quarter ending in September.

On Sunday, the government reported profits as China’s biggest industrial companies declined by a bigger-than-expected 2.1% from a year earlier in the first nine months of 2019. Profit at state-owned companies fell 9.6% while it rose 5.4% at private enterprises.

In Europe, the other 27 EU governments agreed Friday to grant Britain’s request for an extension to its Oct. 31 deadline to leave the trade bloc. But they failed to settle on how long that delay might be.

British politicians want to know the length of the delay before deciding whether to hold an early election. The EU, meanwhile, wants to know what Britain plans to do with the extra time.

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