European stocks head for 7th weekly gain

Yen at two-month high 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, with financiers meticulously positive that the world might avoid a trade war, while the prospect of more rate walkings in Japan this year briefly sent out 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, investors have actually watched out for making any major relocations, given that he followed through on his threat to enforce duties on China while approving Mexico and Canada a one-month reprieve.

The critical U.S. jobs report for January is due ahead of the Wall Street open. Economists anticipate to see 170,000 workers included to nonfarm payrolls last month, wiki.piratenpartei.de however offered the potential distortions from spells of winter and the California wildfires, experienciacortazar.com.ar the series of forecasts is wide.

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

"A quite large divergence from the consensus is still likely needed to move expectations notably however severe weather condition at this time of the year has in the past led to dramatically weaker NFP readings and weather condition could impact today ´ s report," he said.

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

Amazon

slipped in premarket trading on the back of

weakness

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 struck record highs earlier today, following a spate of strong revenues from the similarity Danish weight-loss drugmaker Novo Nordisk, German software company SAP and French loan provider BNP Paribas.

European stocks have actually staged their best performance in a years against Wall Street in the very 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 struck on the AI theme in the wake of home-grown start-up DeepSeek's advancement.

DELICATE CHINA

Beijing's relatively determined response to Trump's tariffs has left space for settlements, analysts say, which has actually helped repair investor sentiment.

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

"Whilst there is substantial noise and uncertainty, we do not see intensifying trade stress as a video 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 reducing this year from the Fed, with a rate cut in July totally 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 actually rallied 7% last year, as financiers priced in an even more aggressive policy position from the Fed this year, where rate cuts might be couple of and far in between.

Other main banks are cutting interest rates, while the Bank of Japan is tailoring up for a minimum of another rate trek this year. Strong wage development data has beefed up 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, its strongest level given that December 10, before easing 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 forecast.

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

(Additional reporting by Ankur Banerjee in Singapore; additional reporting by Stephen Culp, Marc Jones and Alun John; modifying by Shri Navaratnam, Sam Holmes, Gareth Jones and wiki.vst.hs-furtwangen.de Angus MacSwan)