European Shares To Open Higher As Investors Await Cues On Fed's Policy Path

(RTTNews) - European stocks are seen opening a tad higher on Wednesday as investors look ahead to the Federal Reserve's monetary policy announcement due later in the day.

The U.S. central bank is widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged, but traders will pay close attention to the accompanying statement for clues about the outlook for rates.

Amid much uncertainty about the impact of the Trump administration's policies, it looks like that interest-rate cuts may be on a lengthy pause and the next rate cut may come only sometime in the first half of the year.

Markets also eye rate decision from the European Central Bank, which is expected to diverge from the Fed and cut rates by 25 basis points on Thursday.

On the earnings front, U.S. tech icon Microsoft is scheduled to report its quarterly results today and Apple on Thursday.

In Asia, Japanese, Australian and New Zealand shares traded higher while most other markets remain closed for Lunar New Year holidays.

The Aussie dollar fell as weak inflation data raised expectations for a potential interest-rate cut by the Reserve Bank of Australia.

Gold held steady above $2,760 per ounce as the dollar remained resilient.

Oil prices were slightly lower as fears of Libyan supply disruption eased and the American Petroleum Institute reported a smaller-than-expected increase in weekly U.S. crude stockpiles.

U.S. stocks ended higher overnight, tentatively recovering from the previous day's tech slump following DeepSeek's sudden burst onto the AI scene.

In economic releases, durable goods orders fell 2.2 percent in December while consumer confidence has declined for the second month in January, separate reports showed.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite surged 2 percent, the S&P 500 climbed 0.9 percent and the Dow edged up 0.3 percent as focus shifted to upcoming mega-cap earnings and the Fed meeting.

European stocks climbed to a record high on Tuesday as global markets recovered from a tech selloff.

The pan European STOXX 600 rose 0.4 percent. The German DAX gained 0.7 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 added 0.4 percent while France's CAC 40 slipped 0.1 percent.