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Politics : Dutch Central Bank Sale Announcement Imminent? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lucretius who wrote (3449)	2/16/1999 8:15:00 AM
From: Zardoz	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 81101

Tuesday February 16, 7:12 am Eastern Time FOCUS-Dollar soars, Euro bourses drift, bonds up (Adds midday prices) By Tim Castle LONDON, Feb 16 (Reuters) - The yen fell against the dollar on Tuesday to levels not seen since early December after Japan reversed course on its currency and interest rate policy. European stocks retreated from a firm opening in light trade, while bonds and U.S. Treasuries rose. Leading shares remained one percent ahead in London at midday but were below opening levels in Frankfurt and Paris. The dollar surged after Japan's top financial diplomat, Eisuke Sakakibara, said he welcomed the yen's decline after the Bank of Japan (BOJ) eased credit last Friday. -------------------------------------------------------------------- MARKET PRICES AT 1149 GMT EURO 1.1187/12 YEN 117.54/59 STERLING 1.6328/38 GOLD $287.75/288.25 -0.00 (pvs PM fix) BRENT $10.45 +0.08 FTSE 6087.3 +64.10 CAC 4,049.55 -15.64 X-DAX 4884.21 -4.74 -------------------------------------------------------------------- The six-week-old euro fell to its lifetime worst against the dollar, touching a low of $1.1178. Japanese Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa convulsed the foreign exchange market and fuelled a sharp drop in bond yields by saying his ministry would begin buying government bonds from the secondary market later this month or in March. The dollar climbed above 117 yen for the first time since December 1998. Comments by Miyazawa, interpreted as supporting the yen, boosted the dollar further to a high of dollar further to a high of 117.50 yen. In morning European trade the dollar pushed above this level, taking the U.S. currency's gain over 24 hours to more than three yen. In Europe's largest stock market, London, the FTSE 100 stock index pened up more than 1.5 percent, before easing, lifted by full-year results from blue-chip bank Barclays (quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: BARC.L). The bank's shares rose over four percent after it announced full-year pre-tax profits up 12 percent to 1.918 billion pounds ($3.12 billion), broadly in line with expectations. Rival bank NatWest (quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: NWB.L) surged over six percent. British government bonds, or gilts, dropped slightly but sterling was firm against the dollar after underlying British inflation showed an annual rise of 2.6 percent in January, a touch above a forecast 2.5 percent. The data raised doubts whether the Bank of England would cut its repo rate again in March, economists said. The pan-European FTSE Eurotop 300 and The Dow Jones STOXX (^STOXX - news) share indices were both up around 0.5 percent at midday. The banking sector was boosted by further sharp gains in Bank Austria, up seven percent after Goldman Sachs added the bank to its list of recommended shares, citing its recovery from the effects of Russia's economic crisis. Shares in French engineering group Technip rocketed by 11 percent as the market cheered its 10.2 percent gain in 1998 net profits. Among big European companies due to report earnings during the day were Sweden's drugsmaker Astra and consumer goods firm Electrolux. As well as watching company results, investors were expected to keep a close eye on bonds and look ahead to Wall Street's reopening after Monday's U.S. public holiday. U.S. technology stocks were due to be a focus again, with results due after the New York close from Dell Computer Corp (Nasdaq:DELL - news) and Hewlett-Packard (NYSE:HWP - news). In London trading Dell rose $2 to $91-7/8, while Internet stock Yahoo! climbed $4 to $155. The technology-heavy Nasdaq stock index shed 83.66 points last Friday after an extremely volatile week that saw heavy losses as well as its biggest one-day point gain ever. Over the week it fell 51.73 points. European investors were also looking to the week's first batch of U.S. data for further signs of economic strength that could upset bonds by raising fears that a Federal Reserve rate hike take a step closer. U.S. housing starts and industrial production in January were due at 1330 GMT and 1415 GMT respectively. Helped by the fall in Japanese bond yields, Tokyo stocks rose for a fourth straight session with the Nikkei 225 average gaining 177 points, or 1.27 percent, to end at 14,232. Hong Kong and some other Asian markets were closed for the Lunar New Year holiday. biz.yahoo.com