(Adds oil, gold settlement prices)
* S&P 500, Nasdaq hit record highs
* Dollar takes fresh hit, gives gold a fillip
* Oil gives up some gains after output cut
* Graphic: 2020 asset performance http://tmsnrt.rs/2yaDPgn
* Graphic: World FX rates in 2020 http://tmsnrt.rs/2egbfVh
By Herbert Lash
NEW YORK, Aug 18 (Reuters) - Global equities edged higher
and the dollar fell to two-year lows on Tuesday as the broad
U.S. stock market scaled new peaks helped by
better-than-expected corporate earnings by retailers such as
Walmart reporting record online sales.
Both the Nasdaq Composite and S&P 500 set records soon after
the opening bell following strong sales growth as reported by
major U.S. retailers including Walmart, Kohl's and Home Depot.
The benchmark S&P 500 index topped an all-time peak reached
in February just before the onset of COVID-19. The tech-heavy
Nasdaq hit a record high for the second consecutive day in a
session where declining stocks outnumbered rising shares.
Neil Wilson, chief market analyst at Markets.com in London,
said stocks have been steadily marching higher since a pullback
in June, so the record was expected given the large infusions of
stimulus by the Federal Reserve and government deficit spending.
"I'm still surprised we got there without additional
stimulus. But my instinct is that this is too high, it looks
massively overbought. I mean, it's not sustainable looking at
the earnings," Wilson said.
Stephane Barbier de la Serre, macro strategist at Makor
Capital Markets in Geneva, said the fresh highs in U.S. equities
wasn't much of a surprise and he expected further gains.
"I don't seen how markets could go down without an exogenous
shock of some sort on the macro or the pandemic side," Barbier
said of the near future. "In the absence of a game-changer, I
don't see markets turning around."
The near-doubling of online sales in the second quarter
helped Walmart Inc WMT.N trounce Wall Street expectations for
quarterly profit and same-store sales. The S&P 500 .SPX gained 0.32%, led by Amazon.com AMZN.O
and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC added 0.76%. The Dow Jones
Industrial Average .DJI fell 0.09%. In Europe, the broad FTSEurofirst 300 index .FTEU3 closed
down 0.52% at 1,424.85, MSCI's world equity index
.MIWD00000PUS of equity markets in 49 nations rose 1.97 points
or 0.34%, to 573.85.
Gold rose more than 1% to climb back above the $2,000 level
breached earlier this month, as the dollar fell against a basket
of major currencies for a fifth consecutive trading day, under
pressure from low yields and mostly bleak U.S. economic data.
The Fed's intervention in financial markets to maintain
liquidity in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic has weakened
the dollar, pushed risk assets to all-time highs and reduced
demand for safe-havens. The dollar index =USD fell 0.572%, with the euro EUR= up
0.55% to $1.1934. The Japanese yen JPY= strengthened 0.57%
versus the greenback at 105.41 per dollar.
Spot gold prices XAU= rose 0.90% to $2,003.47 an ounce.
U.S. gold futures GCv1 settled up 0.7% at $2,013.10.
U.S. housing starts jumped 22.6% in July in the latest sign
homebuilding is emerging as one of the few areas of strength in
an economy suffering a record slowdown because of the pandemic.
U.S. Treasury yields slid as the market largely snubbed the
strong housing data and looked for signs that a political
stalemate in Washington over a round of aid was easing.
The benchmark 10-year Treasury note US10YT=RR fell 1.3
basis points to yield 0.6704%.
Oil prices slipped after holding steady earlier in the
session, as demand fears weighed despite high compliance with
production cuts from members of the OPEC+ producer group.
Brent crude futures LCOc1 rose 9 cents to settle at $45.46
a barrel. U.S. crude futures CLc1 settled unchanged at $42.89
a barrel.
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Global assets http://tmsnrt.rs/2jvdmXl
Global currencies vs. dollar http://tmsnrt.rs/2egbfVh
Emerging markets http://tmsnrt.rs/2ihRugV
MSCI All Country Wolrd Index Market Cap http://tmsnrt.rs/2EmTD6j
S&P 500 PE revisits dot-com highs https://tmsnrt.rs/2Qa3HDD
S&P 500's bull-to-bear, bear-to-bull journey in 6 months https://tmsnrt.rs/317IssI
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