World shares mixed after rally on Wall St caps dismal week

Bangkok, Dec 23 (AP) World shares were mixed on Monday after US stocks capped a mostly dismal week with a broad rally that still left the benchmark S&P 500 down 2% for the week.
     One shadow over markets was cleared when US lawmakers passed a budget deal in the early hours of Saturday, narrowly averting a pre-Christmas government shutdown.
     Germany's DAX fell 0.3% to 19,830.42. The CAC 40 in Paris slid 0.3% to 7,251.05, while Britain's FTSE shed 0.2% to 8,068.17.
     The future for the S&P 500 gained 0.3% while that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.1%.
     In Asian trading, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 index jumped 1.2% to 39,161.34, while the dollar was trading at 156.50 Japanese yen, up from 156.48 yen.
     Japanese automakers Honda Motor Co and Nissan Motor Corp announced Monday they had agreed to work toward a possible merger that might also include Nissan's smaller alliance partner Mitsubishi Motors Corp Honda's shares, which fell after news of the talks on a deal surfaced last week, jumped 3.8%. Nissan's, which had soared, rose1.6%.
     Elsewhere in Asia, Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 0.8% to 19,883.13, while the Shanghai Composite index slipped 0.5% to 3,351.26.
     Australia's S&P/ASX 500 jumped 1.7% to 8,201.60.
     South Korea's Kospi added 1.6% to 2,442.01 and Taiwan's Taiex jumped 2.6%, with TSMC, the world's biggest computer chip maker, gaining 4.4%. Hon Hai Precision Industry, which reportedly had been maneuvering to buy a big stake in Nissan, jumped 3.8%.
     In Bangkok, the SET advanced 1.4%.
     On Friday, the S&P 500 rallied 1.1% and the Dow jumped 1.2%. The Nasdaq composite gained 1%.
     Roughly nine of every 10 stocks in the S&P 500 rose.
     Superstar stock Nvidia and other Big Tech companies led the market, which got a lift after a report said a measure of inflation the Federal Reserve likes to use was slightly lower last month than economists expected. It's an encouraging signal following recent reports suggesting inflation may be tough to get all the way down to the Fed's 2% goal from its peak above 9%.
     The threat of higher inflation was one of the reasons Fed Chair Jerome Powell gave last week when the central bank hinted it may deliver fewer cuts to interest rates next year than it earlier expected.
     That warning sent a shock through the stock market, which had run to 57 all-time highs this year amid the widespread assumption the Fed would deliver a string of cuts to rates into 2025. Now traders are largely betting on one, two or perhaps even zero next year, according to data from CME Group.
     Critics had been warning stock prices were vulnerable to drops after running so high and that the market likely needed everything to go correctly to justify its stellar gains for the year. Besides the diminished hopes for several rate cuts next year, Wall Street got another reminder late Thursday that everything may not go as expected.
     The US stock market has lost a chunk of its gain since Trump's win on Election Day, which raised hopes for faster economic growth and more lax regulations that would boost corporate profits. Worries have risen that Trump's preference for tariffs and other policies could lead to higher inflation, a bigger US government debt and difficulties for global trade.
     In other dealings early Monday, US benchmark crude oil picked up 24 cents to $69.70 per barrel.
     Brent crude, the international standard, was up 24 cents at $73.18.
     The euro fell to $1.0415 from $1.0433. (AP) SCY
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(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)