European stocks head for 7th weekly gain

Yen at two-month high on rate hike bets

Gold steady near record peak

By Amanda Cooper

LONDON, Feb 7 (Reuters) -

U.S. stock futures steadied on Friday ahead of U.S. payrolls information, with financiers cautiously optimistic that the world might prevent a full-on trade war, while the prospect of more rate walkings in Japan this year briefly sent the yen towards two-month highs.

In a week that started with U.S. President Donald Trump beginning a trade war and whipping up market volatility, investors have watched out for making any significant moves, considered that he followed through on his risk to impose responsibilities on China while approving Mexico and hb9lc.org Canada a one-month reprieve.

The necessary U.S. jobs report for e.bike.free.fr January is due ahead of the Wall Street open. Economists expect to see 170,000 employees added to nonfarm payrolls last month, but provided the potential distortions from spells of cold weather condition and the California wildfires, the series of projections is wide.

"The focus for the monetary markets in recent weeks has been quite on Trump and his economic policies, in particular on trade, however today there is the potential for the tasks information to affect Fed rate expectations," Derek Halpenny, a currency strategist at MUFG, said.

"A quite large divergence from the agreement is still likely needed to move expectations especially but extreme weather condition at this time of the year has in the past resulted in greatly weaker NFP readings and weather condition might impact today ´ s report," he said.

Futures on the Nasdaq and asystechnik.com S&P 500 were trading mainly stable on the day, while shares of

Amazon

insinuated premarket trading on the back of

weak point

in the retailer's cloud system.

In Europe, the STOXX 600 headed for a seventh straight week of gains, trading flat on the day after having actually hit record highs previously this week, following a spate of strong revenues from the similarity Danish weight-loss drugmaker Novo Nordisk, German software business SAP and French lending institution BNP Paribas.

European stocks have staged their best efficiency in a decade against Wall Street in the first 6 weeks of 2025, however the focus is now on whether those gains can be sustained.

On the Asian market, tech stocks staged a rally, powered by Chinese retail financiers, who have actually attacked on the AI style in the wake of home-grown start-up DeepSeek's breakthrough.

DELICATE CHINA

Beijing's seemingly measured reaction to Trump's tariffs has actually left room for settlements, analysts state, equipifieds.com which has helped repair financier sentiment.

China's blue-chip stock index closed up 1.3% after touching a one-month high.

"Whilst there is considerable sound and uncertainty, we do not see intensifying trade stress as a game changer in the potential customers for the Chinese market," said James Cook, financial investment director for emerging markets at Federated Hermes.

Markets are pricing in 43 basis points of this year from the Fed, with a rate cut in July completely priced in, as policymakers remain in no rush to start the rate-cutting cycle again.

The dollar edged up 0.1% against a basket of currencies, having rallied 7% last year, as financiers priced in an even more aggressive policy stance from the Fed this year, classifieds.ocala-news.com where rate cuts may be rare.

Other main banks are cutting rate of interest, while the Bank of Japan is tailoring up for a minimum of another rate trek this year. Strong wage development data has intensified the chances of tighter monetary policy, which has actually pressed the yen to two-month highs against the dollar.

The yen touched 150.96 per dollar overnight, yewiki.org its greatest level since December 10, before reducing to leave the dollar up 0.4% on the day at 152.155.

Sterling reversed earlier losses to increase 0.1% to $1.2449, having actually dropped 0.5% on Thursday as the BoE cut interest rates and slashed its 2025 UK development projection.

In products, oil edged up, while gold steadied above $2,800 an ounce, close to tape highs.

(Additional reporting by Ankur Banerjee in Singapore; extra reporting by Stephen Culp, Marc Jones and Alun John; editing by Shri Navaratnam, Sam Holmes, Gareth Jones and Angus MacSwan)