World stocks buoyed by central banks and good earnings season

London — A wave of central bank easing and positive noise from the earnings season buoyed world stocks on Tuesday, while the pound fell before the expected confirmation of hard-Brexit advocate Boris Johnson as the country’s prime minister.

Corporate results from oil bellwether Halliburton, Swiss bank UBS and Apple supplier AMS all helped Europe’s Stoxx 600 benchmark add 0.5% to Monday’s gains.

The automotive industry also gained as German parts makers Hella and French peer Faurecia surged nearly 6% and tyre maker Continental rose 4% despite a profit warning, putting the sector on track for its best day since April 1.

“The results are coming in and have helped the market today and we are still under the influence of interest rates,” said François Savary, the chief investment officer of Prime Partners, referring to expectations of US and ECB rate cuts. He also said Wall Street earnings had provided no real worries so far and this week’s results from Facebook, Amazon and Google parent Alphabet would “drive the market up the road”.

Among currencies, the dollar reached a two-week high after US President Donald Trump and congressional leaders agreed on Monday to a two-year extension of the US debt limit, ending the threat a government default later this year.

The New Zealand dollar led G10 losses after its central bank said it had “begun scoping a project to refresh our unconventional monetary policy strategy and implementation”, although it added it was at a very early stage.

Sterling slid towards the mid $1.24 region with eurosceptic Boris Johnson set to replace Prime Minister Theresa May in a matter of hours. Concern that Britain will crash out of the EU without a deal have grown since Johnson said he would pull Britain out on Octiber 31 “do or die”.

The pound traded at $1.2459, near last week’s 27-month low of $1.2382.

“Johnson is  to become the new prime minister, so there is a real chance of a hard Brexit,” said Takuya Kanda, GM of research at Gaitame.Com Research Institute in Tokyo.

The euro fell 0.2% to $1.1189, weighed down by the likelihood of even more negative European Central Bank (ECB) interest rates in the coming months. The central bank meets on Thursday.

“It is going to take a bold stroke by the ECB to both satisfy markets clamouring for incremental easing and make a difference to the economy, all the while remaining inside its institutional setting and not destabilising the financial system,” wrote Carl Weinberg, chief international economist at High Frequency Economics.

Hot-spots 

Europe’s government bonds barely budged, with their yields slumping since the start of the year. Some yields did tick higher after the US move on its debt ceiling.

Germany’s 10-year bond yield, the benchmark for the eurozone, was up a basis point, but at minus 0.34% was near Monday’s two-week low and not far from the record low posted at the start of the month.

Upcoming events to watch include the first of potentially two confidence votes in Spain. Caretaker prime minister Pedro Sánchez needs an absolute majority to form a formal coalition with far-left rivals Podemos.

There was also a rumoured meeting between the leaders of the two squabbling parties who make up Italy’s coalition government, Five Star Movement’s Luigi Di Maio and Northern League’s Matteo Salvini.

“Investors are waiting to see whether this government will survive,” said DZ Bank strategist Daniel Lenz. “One possibility is that the coalition continues but both agree to replace [Giuseppe] Conte as prime minister, which would be a very bad signal.”

Conte is widely seen as a moderating influence on the anti-establishment Italian government, particularly in terms of its relationship with Brussels.

In commodities, Brent crude added 0.19% to reach $63.38 a barrel. It had risen 1.2% the day before on concern over possible supply disruptions after Iran seized a British tanker last week.

Reuters