European Shares Seen Opening Up In Cautious Trade

(RTTNews) - European stocks are seen opening flat to slightly higher on Wednesday ahead of a busy day on the economic calendar.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell's congressional testimony is likely to be in the spotlight today, along with reports on U.S. private sector employment, job openings and the Fed's Beige Book.

Powell is due to testify before the House Financial Services Committee later today and the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday.

Meanwhile, British finance minister Jeremy Hunt will deliver his 2024 Budget today and there is speculation he could cut taxes for households in some fashion.

German trade balance figures and Eurozone retail sales data will also be closely monitored as the day progresses.

The European Central Bank meets on Thursday, with a decision to cut interest rates likely to be pushed back until June.

Asian stocks were seeing modest gains, with Hong Kong's Hang Seng index rallying nearly 2 percent as investors await clues on policy support details from the National People's Congress (NPC) this week.

Gold held steady near record highs, fueled by growing expectations of the Federal Reserve's potential interest rate cut in June.

The dollar traded firm while oil edged up slightly after two days of losses on concerns about demand growth in China, the world's biggest crude importer.

U.S. stocks fell sharply overnight to extend losses from the previous session, as investors digested weak economic readings and looked ahead to Powell's testimony for directional cues.

U.S. services industry growth slowed a bit in February and new orders for manufactured goods dropped more than expected in January, raising concerns about the state of the world's largest economy.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite plunged 1.7 percent to suffer its worst single-day loss in three weeks, while the S&P 500 and the Dow both lost about 1 percent each.

European stocks closed lower on Tuesday as China jitters offset encouraging business activity data showing signs of recovery in the euro zone last month.

The pan European STOXX 600 gave up 0.2 percent. The German DAX slipped 0.1 percent and France's CAC 40 shed 0.3 percent while the U.K.'s FTSE 100 finished marginally higher.