- Trump's tariff timeline offers markets reprieve
- Gold prices set for seventh straight week of gains
- Chinese tech stocks rally rages on
SINGAPORE, Feb 14 (Reuters) - Global stocks rose on Friday, while the dollar wobbled as investors enjoyed what might just be a brief moment of respite after U.S. President Donald Trump's reciprocal tariffs were not immediately imposed, suggesting room for negotiations.
Trump's plans to impose reciprocal tariffs on every country taxing U.S. imports have stoked fears of a wide-ranging trade war, pushing gold prices to a record high earlier this week. Gold was set for a seventh straight week of gains.
The directive from Trump on Thursday stopped short of imposing fresh tariffs, instead kicking off what could be weeks or months of investigation into the levies imposed on U.S. goods by other trading partners and then devising a response.
"While global financial markets may be inclined to take some relief from the delay in the immediate imposition of reciprocal tariffs, it is not clear to us whether the delay necessarily reflects a lower likelihood that they will eventually be imposed," Barclays analysts said in a note.
Trump last week kicked off a trade war, first by imposing tariffs on Mexico and Canada and then pausing them, but sticking with duties on Chinese goods.
"It seems that Trump's bark has once again proved worse than his bite when it comes to the matter of trade," said Michael Brown, senior research strategist at Pepperstone.
"That doesn't, however, stop this now rather tiresome merry-go-round of headlines, nor the accompanying yo-yo price action, as participants grapple with whatever the latest story is, and try to discount it."
European futures pointed to a lower open after the pan-European STOXX 600 index and Germany's DAX closed at a record high on Thursday. Futures for Nasdaq and S&P 500 inched higher.
In Asia, the spotlight has been on a rally in Chinese tech stocks, with the Hang Seng Tech Index hitting its highest level in three years on Thursday spurred by home-grown start-up DeepSeek's breakthrough.
On Friday, Hong Kong's benchmark index rose over 2%, taking its weekly gains to 5%, its fifth straight week of gains and the strongest weekly performance in four months.
James Ooi, market strategist at Tiger Brokers, said the DeepSeek-driven rally appears to have further upside in the short term, but a sustained rally will depend on the Chinese tech sector's ability to monetise AI.
"While Chinese tech companies trade at lower valuations, their reliance on domestic revenue limits their potential to reach valuation levels comparable to global tech giants ... they (also) face heightened scrutiny over privacy and security concerns," Ooi said.
That left the MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan up 0.37%, hovering near the two-month high it touched on Thursday. Japan's Nikkei fell 0.8% but was on track to eke out gains for the week.
INFLATION WATCH
Data on Thursday showed U.S. producer prices increased solidly in January, bolstering financial market views that the Federal Reserve would not be cutting interest rates before the second half of the year.
But components of the data that are part of the personal consumption expenditures (PCE), the Fed's preferred inflation measure, were soft and added to hopes the PCE reading may be cooler than currently expected.
The data comes on the heels of Wednesday's consumer price index (CPI), which showed its largest acceleration in nearly 1-1/2 years.
The yield on benchmark U.S. 10-year notes was steady at 4.531% after tumbling 10 basis points on Thursday, clocking its biggest daily drop in a month.
The dollar index , which measures the greenback against a basket of currencies, was last at 107.13 after dropping 0.8% on Thursday, its biggest one-day percentage drop since January 20.
The euro hovered near its highest in more than two weeks at $1.0453, supported by optimism around potential peace talks between Ukraine and Russia.
Oil prices rose on Friday, poised to end three weeks of decline, buoyed partly by rising fuel demand.
Brent futures were up 0.2% at $75.17 a barrel while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude gained 0.14% to $71.39.
Reporting by Ankur Banerjee and Chuck Mikolajczak, additional reporting by Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss in New York and Noel Randwich in San Francisco; editing by Deepa Babington, Stephen Coates and Sam Holmes
Source: Reuters