European Shares Poised For Weak Start As Fed Meet Gets Underway

(RTTNews) - European stocks are seen opening lower on Tuesday amid anxiety ahead of key central bank meetings.

The downside, if any, may remain capped by China stimulus optimism after the country's top leaders vowed more measures to boost employment and expand consumption in a bid to revive a "tortuous" economic recovery.

Asian stocks traded mixed, with Chinese and Hong Kong markets seeing big gains after the Politburo, a top decision-making body of the ruling Communist Party, pledged more support for the beleaguered property sector.

Oil prices held steady in Asian trade after climbing over 2 percent to a three-month high on Monday.

Gold edged higher as the dollar weakened and Treasury yields dropped amid expectations that the Fed meeting on Wednesday could deliver a 25-bps rate hike and signal the end of policy tightening.

The ECB and BOJ meetings along with earnings results from tech giants including Meta, Microsoft and Alphabet also remain on investors' radar.

3M, General Electric, General Motors and Verizon are among the prominent companies due to report their quarterly results before the U.S. opening bell later today.

The European economic calendar remains light, with the German Ifo business survey results awaited later in the day.

The business climate index is forecast to fall to 88.0 in July from 88.5 in the previous month.

Overnight, U.S. stocks eked out modest gains as Chevron reported better-than-expected earnings and data showed that U.S. business activity grew at its slowest pace in five months in July.

The Dow rose half a percent to close higher for the 11th day in a row, marking the longest winning streak since February 2017. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite edged up 0.2 percent and the S&P 500 added 0.4 percent.

European stocks closed mixed on Monday as hopes for Chinese stimulus measures offset fresh data pointing to a slowdown in Eurozone business activity and an inconclusive election result in Spain.

The pan European STOXX 600 ended flat with a positive bias. The German DAX finished marginally higher and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 gained 0.2 percent while France's CAC 40 ended little changed with a negative bias.