By Sinéad Carew and Nell Mackenzie
NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) -MSCI’s global equities index rose slightly on Friday, eyeing a third straight day of gains, while the dollar lost ground as a U.S. trade deal with Britain fueled guarded optimism for U.S. tariff negotiations with other countries including China.
While U.S. President Trump pushed back against the idea that UK deal could be a template for other trade negotiations, traders are keenly awaiting a meeting due Saturday in Switzerland between the U.S. Treasury Secretary and chief trade negotiator with China’s economic tsar.
In the meantime, India on Friday offered to slash its tariff gap with the U.S. to less than 4% from nearly 13% now, in exchange for an exemption from “current and potential” tariff hikes, Reuters reported.
MSCI’s broadest index of world shares rose 2.05 points, or 0.24%, to 847.90 while U.S. indexes were higher and Germany’s Dax stock index hit a record high.
Trump said on Friday that 80% tariffs on Chinese goods “seems right” in his first suggestion of an alternative to the 145% levies he has imposed on China.
A signal that the U.S. is willing to make any cut on tariffs was incrementally positive, according to Matt Stucky, chief portfolio manager for equities at Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management.
“The major drivers in the market in the short term have been updates on the labor market driving Fed expectations alongside what’s happening with trade negotiations,” said Stucky.
But he said he is concerned that the market seems to be “looking through this as if there’s not going to be much economic disruption or much risk of downside occurring in the economy over the next year or so from trade disruptions.”
On Wall Street at 11:09 a.m. the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 56.51 points, or 0.14%, to 41,311.94, the S&P 500 rose 4.61 points, or 0.08%, to 5,668.55 and the Nasdaq Composite rose 35.78 points, or 0.20%, to 17,963.92. The pan-European STOXX 600 index rose 0.43%.
In currencies, the U.S. dollar index, which measures the currency against six major peers including the euro and the yen, fell 0.37% to 100.28.
The euro was up 0.36% at $1.1267 while against the Japanese yen, the dollar weakened 0.58% to145.07.
In cryptocurrencies, bitcoin eyed its fourth straight day of gains, touching its highest level since January after Thursday’s advance, which was the biggest in a month.
Bitcoin gained 0.55% to $103,191.87 while ethereum rose 6.12% to $2,318.17.
U.S. Treasury yields slipped, with thinner volume than usual and sentiment still uncertain, as investors looked ahead to talks between the Trump administration and China.
The yield on benchmark U.S. 10-year notes fell 1 basis points to 4.363%, from 4.373% late on Thursday. The 30-year bond yield rose 0.3 basis points to 4.8343%.
The 2-year note yield, which typically moves in step with interest rate expectations for the Federal Reserve, fell 3.9 basis points to 3.856%, from 3.895% late on Thursday.
In commodities, oil prices rose on Friday and looked poised for a weekly gain with investors pinning hopes on the upcoming U.S./China trade talks.
U.S. crude rose 1.35% to $60.72 a barrel and Brent rose to $63.63 per barrel, up 1.26% on the day.
Gold prices rose as the dollar weakened, while investors digested the remarks from Trump ahead of the weekend talks.
Spot gold rose 1.04% to $3,339.78 an ounce. U.S. gold futures rose 1.18% to $3,335.50 an ounce.
(Reporting by Nell Mackenzie in London and Kevin Buckland in Tokyo; Additional reporting by Dhara Ranasinghe; Editing by Toby Chopra and David Evans)
