daytrading april 18 pre-market

Morning traders.

Market wrap:

A successful Spanish bond auction and upbeat global economic news fuelled Wall Street's biggest rally in a month and have Australian shares pointed sharply higher this morning.

The June SPI 200 futures contract ended the night session 51 points or 1.2% stronger at 4342 as an easing in euro-zone debt fears saw investors snap up risk assets, including equities and commodities.

The Dow surged 194 points or 1.5% to 13,116, its first close above 13,000 in a week. The S&P 500 put on 1.55% and the Nasdaq erased Monday's heavy fall with a gain of 1.82% as Apple bounced back from five days of losses.

Fears over Spain were soothed by unexpectedly strong demand for government bonds at an auction last night. The solid result helped drag Spanish and Italian 10-year yields down from levels seen as potentially perilous.

Also helping sentiment was an unexpected increase in investor confidence in Germany and an upgraded economic outlook from the International Monetary Fund. The IMF raised its growth prediction for the global economy this year to 3.5% from 3.3%, saying the economy was fragile but slowly improving.

The overseas news helped US investors ignore some tepid domestic economic reports. Housing permits increased 4.5% last month but home construction dropped 5.8% and industrial production was flat for a second month.

"The market was able to shrug off disappointing economic reports," the head of asset allocation for ING Investment Management in the US told Bloomberg. "We've got data showing the German economy is growing strong, positive earnings surprises in the US and some good news out of Spain. There's a lot of room for positive surprises given how pessimistic things were."

European markets flew higher as "peripheral" bond yields sank and Germany's closely-watched ZEW indicator of investor sentiment improved for a fifth straight month. Italy's FTSE MIB jumped 3.68%, Spain's IBEX 35 2.28%, Germany's DAX 2.65%, France's CAC 2.72% and Britain's FTSE 1.78%.

"Risk-on" buying boosted oil and metals, with copper rebounding from a three-month low and gold advancing for the first session in three. In London, copper gained 1%, aluminium 0.7%, nickel 1.75%, tin 1% and zinc 0.2%. Lead lost 0.3%. US copper was recently up 0.35%.

"What we see in copper prices today is just a recovery move which could last a few days," an analyst at Commerzbank told Reuters. "But given that the debt crisis in the euro-zone seems to be back in focus and given the higher risk aversion and growing uncertainty this is likely to only be a temporary move and we still expect prices might go down again very quickly."

West Texas crude rallied to its highest level in at least two weeks. Oil for May delivery in May was recently up $1.10 or 1.4% at US$104.32 a barrel.

Gold reversed early losses to edge higher in recent trade. Gold for June delivery was lately ahead $1.20 or 0.1% at US$1,650.90 an ounce.

TRADING THEMES TODAY

REBOUND: The ASX is likely to open at its highest level in nearly two weeks after European and US equities staged a welcome recovery overnight. That should deliver a "gap-up" start to the day, offering tasty profit opportunities for those with the courage to accumulate over two days of weakness here. After that? History shows our market usually struggles to build on strong opens, most often giving way to a slow fade. Gains in the US last night appear broad and spread fairly evenly across the sectors.

ECONOMIC NEWS: The Melbourne Institute's leading index of economic indicators is due at 10.30am EST. A relatively quiet night ahead for scheduled news offers a swag of UK data and the weekly crude oil inventory in the US.

Good luck to all.