Hopes for central bank action in Europe and the US helped push US equities and Australian futures higher overnight.
The June SPI 200 futures contract ended the night session 17 points or 0.4% ahead at 4101 as Wall Street reversed Monday's declines, oil rallied for the first session in four and gold advanced for a third night.
US stocks closed at their highs for the session after Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago President Charles Evans backed fresh measures to stimulate the economy, and the European Central Bank proposed a bank deposit guarantee scheme. Resource stocks and industrials fronted a 1.17% rally on the S&P 500. The Dow put on 163 points or 1.31% and the Nasdaq added 1.19%.
"If it wasn't for Europe, US equity prices would be significantly higher than they currently are," the chief market strategist at RDM Financial in the US told MarketWatch. "But the volatility of the past few weeks is probably going to be with us through the summer until we have a comprehensive solution to deal with Europe's debt and growth problems."
Federal Reserve member Evans told Bloomberg Television he supported any measure that would stimulate job growth in the US, including asset purchases, buying mortgage-backed securities or an extension of Operation Twist. His comments came ahead of a hotly-anticipated Federal Reserve meeting next week.
A night of mixed news in Europe saw the Spanish 10-year bond yield hit a record high as Fitch downgraded 18 Spanish banks, saying Spain will "significantly" miss its budget target. However, most markets finished higher after the ECB's biannual review included support for a scheme to guarantee bank deposits. Such a scheme would be intended to insulate euro-zone sovereign credit ratings from the pressure of supporting troubled banks. Read more here.
Gold extended its rally to a third session on the promise of further central bank intervention and continuing turmoil in euro-zone bond markets. Gold for August was recently up $14.10 or 0.9% at US$1,610.90 an ounce.
Oil improved for the first session in four, boosted by the rally in US stocks ahead of tomorrow's OPEC meeting. West Texas crude for July delivery put on 78 cents or 0.9% to US$83.48 a barrel.
Most base metals lost ground as Sunday's Greek election continued to weigh on risk appetite. In London, copper eased 0.3%, aluminium 0.2%, lead 1%, nickel 0.9% and zinc 0.5%. Tin added 1%. US copper for July delivery was recently up one cent or 0.2% at US$3.35 a pound.
TRADING THEMES TODAY
BULLS WIN THE NIGHT: A generally bullish night on Wall Street as US traders delivered their usual Pavlovian response to any hint of stimulus. That dragged some of the attention away from a pretty grim day in Spain, where the 10-year bond yield drew precariously close to 7% before a late drop. As someone smarter than me pointed out last night, the problem with all these bailouts in the euro-zone is that they're running out of countries to fund them. With Spain and Italy in trouble, Germany and France are left holding the bucket - and France is not looking too flash. But that's a problem for another day. In the meantime, mining and industrial stocks led the gains in the US overnight and may provide any momentum here today. Banks were also solid.
ECONOMIC NEWS: Reserve Bank Governor Glenn Stevens is due to address the Prime Minister's Economic Forum in Brisbane at 9.10am EST. Consumer sentiment figures are due at 10.30am. A busy night in the US includes retail sales and core retail sales, the producer price index and core PPI, crude oil inventories and business inventories.
