European stocks head for 7th weekly gain

Yen at two-month high up on rate hike bets

Gold stable near record peak

By Amanda Cooper

LONDON, Feb 7 (Reuters) -

U.S. stock futures steadied on Friday ahead of U.S. payrolls information, grandtribunal.org with financiers very carefully positive that the world might avoid 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 began with U.S. President Donald Trump starting a trade war and whipping up market volatility, financiers have watched out for making any major moves, offered that he followed through on his risk to impose tasks on China while approving Mexico and Canada a one-month reprieve.

The all-important U.S. jobs report for January is due ahead of the Wall Street open. Economists expect to see 170,000 employees included to nonfarm payrolls last month, however offered the possible distortions from spells of winter and the California wildfires, passfun.awardspace.us the range of projections is large.

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

"A pretty big divergence from the consensus is still likely required to shift expectations especially but extreme weather condition at this time of the year has in the past resulted in sharply weaker NFP readings and weather could impact today ´ s report," he said.

Futures on the Nasdaq and S&P 500 were trading mainly steady on the day, while shares of

Amazon

insinuated premarket trading on the back of

weakness

in the retailer's cloud unit.

In Europe, the STOXX 600 headed for a seventh straight week of gains, trading flat on the day after having hit record highs earlier this week, following a spate of strong incomes from the similarity Danish weight-loss drugmaker Novo Nordisk, German software application company SAP and French loan provider BNP Paribas.

European stocks have staged their best performance in a decade against Wall Street in the first 6 weeks of 2025, but 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 caught the AI style in the wake of home-grown start-up DeepSeek's advancement.

DELICATE CHINA

Beijing's apparently measured action to Trump's tariffs has actually left room for settlements, experts say, which has actually assisted repair investor belief.

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

"Whilst there is substantial sound and uncertainty, we don't see escalating trade stress as a game changer in the potential customers for the Chinese market," said James Cook, investment director for emerging markets at Federated Hermes.

Markets are pricing in 43 basis points of easing this year from the Fed, with a rate cut in July completely priced in, higgledy-piggledy.xyz as policymakers remain in no hurry to begin the rate-cutting cycle again.

The dollar edged up 0.1% against a basket of currencies, having actually rallied 7% last year, as investors priced in a far more policy position from the Fed this year, where rate cuts may be scarce.

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

The yen touched 150.96 per dollar over night, wiki.eqoarevival.com its greatest level considering that December 10, before alleviating 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 dropped 0.5% on Thursday as the BoE cut interest rates and slashed its 2025 UK growth projection.

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

(Additional reporting by Ankur Banerjee in Singapore; extra reporting by Stephen Culp, Marc Jones and Alun John; editing by Shri Navaratnam, forum.batman.gainedge.org Sam Holmes, Gareth Jones and annunciogratis.net Angus MacSwan)