Asia
Japanese markets pushed higher on Tuesday in the absence of negative news over North Korea and with an extra push from more records set on Wall Street on Monday. Japan’s Nikkei surged through 20,000, rising nearly 2% on the day, revisiting levels last seen since August 2015 when the index was near 16-year highs.
The Topix index was up by a similar amount, closing at 1667.88. Markets in mainland China and Hong Kong were more subdued, with the CSI 100 and the Hang Seng index falling modestly on Monday’s levels.
Europe
In eurozone markets, investors were unmoved as the ZEW confidence survey came in better than expected: German, French and Italian indices were little changed on the day.
In London, the FTSE 100 was a touch higher in mid-morning trading as upbeat news on supermarket sales growth was offset by currency effects after the Bank of England governor Mark Carney suggested that interest rate rises were likely this year.
Supermarkets were top of the FTSE 100 leaderboard amid news that the UK’s biggest grocers had posted strong sales in the last quarter: WM Morrison (MRW) shares were the biggest riser on the FTSE 100 on Tuesday morning, gaining 2%, Sainsbury’s (SRBY) shares were up by nearly 2%, while Tesco (TSCO) was 1% higher. In the FTSE 250, Ocado (OCDO) was the biggest faller as investors overlooked revenue and order growth to focus on a fall in the average order value.
Abu-Dhabi-based healthcare provider NMC Health (NMC) made a poor start to its FTSE 100 debut, falling over 2%.
North America
The Federal Reserve begins its meeting today ahead of its announcement on interest rates on Wednesday, where the central bank is expected to keep rates unchanged. Futures for the Dow and S&P 500 forecast a rise to yet more record highs. Nasdaq-listed Adobe (ADBE) and NYSE-listed FedEx (FDX) report earnings after market close.
In terms of economic data, US housing starts for August are out, as are Canadian manufacturing shipments for July.
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