LONDON/SYDNEY — Shares climbed globally on Tuesday, fuelled by optimism around all things AI luring money into technology stocks, while bets on US interest rate cuts lifted gold to a record high.
The EURO STOXX 600, which have tended to lag in the rush to tech stocks, gained 0.4 percent, boosted by utilities, with German and French indexes climbing 0.5 percent and 0.7 percent respectively.
Dutch chip equipment maker ASML dropped 1.2 percent, however, keeping gains in check.
On Monday, Wall Street was led to another record as Nvidia announced it would invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI with the first data centre gear to be delivered in the second half of 2026.
The seemingly inexorable rise in tech stocks attracted money from momentum funds and option players, and fuelled gains for wider indexes.
“It’s been the Magnificent 7 driving the gains,” Deutsche Bank analysts wrote, referring to seven dominant tech companies that have driven the US stock market’s growth.
“The profile of US equity gains is looking very much like 2023 and 2024 again, where the annual gains are being driven by a very narrow group of stocks.”
Chris Weston, head of research at broker Pepperstone, noted that investors were hedging their exposure to stocks by buying gold.
The metal hit a record at $3,759.02 per ounce, and was nearly 9 percent higher for the month so far.
S&P 500 futures were little changed, while Nasdaq futures slipped 0.3 percent, after hitting new peaks overnight.
Investors were also focused on impending comments from US Federal Reserve officials including Chair Jerome Powell later in the day, to assess the US central bank’s monetary policy trajectory after it cut interest rates last week.
Euro zone bond yields erased losses after the release of data on the region’s business activity. The benchmark 10-year German yield moved to 2.75 percent, flat on the day, after data showed that activity grew in Europe’s largest economy an accelerated pace in September.
All three major US stock indexes registered record closing highs for a third straight session on Monday,
In Asia, chip sectors have benefited from the demand for tech stocks, with South Korean stocks up 0.5 percent, having surged over 9 percent this month.
Japan’s Nikkeiwas closed for a holiday but has climbed 6.5 percent so far in September, while Taiwan has risen almost 7 percent.
Chinese blue chips recovered losses to trade flat, its liquidity-fuelled bull run petering out in recent days.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan eked out a miniscule daily gain, and is still 5.5 percent higher on the month.
Equities globally have been underpinned by expectations of a series of further rate cuts from the Fed following last week’s easing.
Futures imply around a 90 percent chance of a further quarter-point rate cut in October, and a 75 percent probability of an easing in December as well.
