Real estate companies rose as investors, comfortable that interest rates would remain low, looked for income. On Wall Street, the futures for the Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard & Poor’s 500 were both up 0.3 percent.
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The European oil and gas index rose 2.4 per cent, helped by a 2.4 to 5.1 per cent rise in BP, Total and Saipem.
The dollar hit a near 4-week low against the yen on Thursday after the U.S. Federal Reserve kept monetary policy steady and projected a less aggressive path for interest rates hikes in coming years. The statement the Fed released following its two-day policy meeting pointedly said that the case for raising overnight rates had “strengthened”, its projections showed that all but three of meeting participants envisaged higher rates by year-end, and Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen in her news conference said she was “pleased with how the USA economy is doing”. The central bank said risks to its economic outlook are “roughly balanced”.
The danger is that betting that the Fed won’t raise rates has been such a moneymaker in recent years that it has become investors’ knee-jerk response.
BONDS AND CURRENCIES: U.S. government bond prices rose.
Energy shares were also in demand after oil prices also rose on a weaker U.S. dollar, extending gains from the previous session when a surprise third consecutive weekly United States crude inventory draw tightened supply. US benchmark crude rose 98 cents to close at $46.32 a barrel, while Brent crude, used to price worldwide oils, gained 82 cents to close at $47.65 a barrel.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan extended gains to 1.2 per cent in its sixth straight session of increases, just 0.9 per cent shy of its one-year high touched earlier this month.
The Nasdaq is up 94.96 points, or 1.8 percent.
Other commodities also rose, which helped out materials stocks.
“By 2019, I expect the unemployment rate to have declined below 4.5 percent”.
Red Hat rose 6.7 percent to $82.27 after the Linux operating system distributor reported second-quarter revenue and profit that beat market expectations.
Yahoo was down 1.6 percent at $43.44, a day after the company said at least 500 million of its accounts were hacked in 2014 in a theft that appeared to be the world’s biggest known cyber breach.
Economists believe policymakers would avoid a rate hike in November in part because the meeting falls just days before the US presidential election.
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USA stocks were also supported by the Bank of Japan’s surprise decision to adopt a “yield curve control” under which it will buy long-term government bonds to keep 10-year bond yields at current levels around zero percent.
