* Alcoa earnings help lift world stocks
* Wall Street set for gains
* European shares up 1.1 percent, Japan loses 1.4 percent
* Yen, dollar retreat after recent gains
By Jeremy Gaunt, European Investment Correspondent
LONDON, July 9 (Reuters) - Forecast-beating results from
U.S. bellwether Alcoa <AA.N> helped lift European stocks, draw
global equities out of the red and set Wall Street on track for
gains on Thursday.
Currency markets also reversed some of their recent cautious
patterns and oil halted a six-session losing streak.
The Bank of England, as expected, keep interest rates on
hold at a record low of 0.5 percent but surprised some in the
market by not expanding its quantitative easing scheme to
sustain attempts to lift Britain out of recession.
Alcoa kicked off the U.S. earnings season on Wednesday by
reporting a third consecutive quarterly loss, but it beat
estimates by a large margin due to cost cuts.
Stock markets have been hit over recent weeks as second
thoughts about the chances of a quick global economic recovery
have taken hold.
The corporate earnings reporting season is likely to
dominate bourses as it gets under way properly next week for
what it says about how companies are weathering the global
recession.
"There has been nothing reassuring in macro data lately, so
people are really hoping for good surprises on the earnings
front," said David Thebault, head of quantitative sales trading,
at Global Equities, in Paris.
World stocks as measured by MSCI <.MIWD00000PUS> were up
about 0.4 percent, following seven consecutive sessions of
losses.
The FTSEurofirst 300 <> index of top European shares
was up more than 1 percent, bouncing back from a 10-week low hit
on Wednesday. Earlier, however, Japan's Nikkei <> closed
down 1.4 percent on economic worries.
European shares were also helped by rising energy company
stocks, lifted by oil prices rising above $61 a barrel.
SLOW RECOVERY
Foreign exchange traders reversed some of their previous
risk-aversion trades with Japan's yen falling after hitting a
five-month high against the dollar on Wednesday.
The dollar also dipped against currencies other than the
yen.
Sentiment was helped by a report from the International
Monetary Fund on Wednesday saying the global economy was slowly
starting to pull out of a deep recession, although the recovery
would be sluggish [].
The euro was up half a percent at $1.3956 <EUR=> and the
dollar gained a bit on the yen <JPY=>.
Euro zone government bond futures retreated from two-month
highs hit in after-hours trade the previous session, tracking
moves in U.S. Treasuries which succumbed to profit-taking after
a sharp rally.
Treasuries shot higher, pushing 10-year yields to seven-week
lows, after an auction of 10-year paper attracted surprisingly
strong demand late on Wednesday. That gave Bunds a lift in after
hours trading, also prompting investors to book profits.
(Additional reporting by Blaise Robinson; editing by Chris
Pizzey)
(To read Reuters Global Investing Blog click on
http://blogs.reuters.com/globalinvesting; for the MacroScope
Blog click on http://blogs.reuters.com/macroscope; for Hedge Hub
click on http://blogs.reuters.com/hedgehub)
