Asia
Japan made a strong start to the trading year with a 3% rise in the Nikkei and 2.5% rise in the Topix powering the country’s equity markets to a 26-year high. The 700+ point gain in the Nikkei index pushed it comfortably through the 23,000 points level last touched in November 2017. After a positive start to 2018, Chinese equity markets made more modest gains on Thursday, with the CSI 300 up by just under 0.5% - despite a strong showing from the country’s service sector in December.
Europe
Another strong performance on Wall Street set the tone for a rise in Asian and European equities today. Economic activity in the eurozone is at a near-seven year high, which pushed the euro up against other major currencies. Usually this drags European equities down, but today Germany’s Dax was over 1% higher than Wednesday’s close, with similar gains seen for France’s CAC 40.
In the UK, the FTSE 100 hovered around record highs but failed to make significant moves higher as the pound was boosted by news of a stronger-than-expected growth in the key service sector. The services purchasing managers’ index (PMI) follows below-forecast readings from the equivalent surveys in the manufacturing and construction sectors.
In company news, shares in department store Debenhams (DEB) plunged on a profits warning, despite higher like-for-like sales over the Christmas period and a rise in online sales. Marks & Spencer (MKS) shares were also under pressure ahead of a forthcoming Christmas trading update.
North America
Weekly jobless claims to the end of December are expected to show a slight increase than the week before Christmas. This builds up to the biggest economic data of the year so far, the December non-farm payroll numbers. These are expected to show that 188,000 new jobs were created in the month, compared with 228,000 the month before. The US unemployment rate is forecast to remain at 4.1%, while Canada’s jobless rate is expected to have risen to 6% in the last month of the year.
In terms of companies reporting, Monsanto (MON) is reporting before the market opens.