U.S. small-caps in favourable set-up
STOXX 600 up 0.2%
Luxury, miners lead gains
China Q3 GDP disappoints
Upside surprise in UK retail sales
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U.S. SMALL-CAPS IN FAVOURABLE SET-UP
U.S. small-cap firms have bounced this month on an improving outlook for the domestic economy and optimism over earnings growth, with additional boost from prospects of Donald Trump winning the election next month.
The domestically focused Russell 2000 .RUT, which is more sensitive to the U.S. economic outlook, has risen 4% since Oct. 10 and trades near its highest since late 2021 as a spate of recent data underscored the resilience of the world's largest economy. The large cap S&P 500 .SPX has risen just 0.9% in that same period.
"We're moving down in market cap, into some of the small- and mid-cap market," said Nate Thooft, chief investment officer of the multi-asset solutions team at Manulife Investment Management about positioning in U.S. equities.
"Earnings expectations look a bit more favourable than they have in quite some time versus their large cap counterparts. The potential for them to deliver on those earnings is reasonably good versus what we have seen over the last couple of years."
Earnings for the Russell 2000 .RUT profit are expected to grow 38.7% in the third-quarter year-on-year, LSEG I/B/E/S data showed. In the second quarter, aggregate earnings for the index grew after five consecutive quarters of declines.
Upbeat earnings from a number of small-cap finance stocks, a major weight in the Russell 2000, has also supported the index's recent rally, analysts said.
Meanwhile, the S&P 500, which is heavily geared toward technology firms, is likely to deliver earnings growth of 4.9% in the third quarter.
Further helping the small-cap stocks was the "Trump trade" as polls show a tight race between Republican candidate Donald Trump and his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris on expectations that Trump will keep taxes low and reduce regulation.
(Medha Singh and Alun John)
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