Rising oil prices helped lift equity markets worldwide yesterday, while the US dollar jumped ahead of a meeting of Federal Reserve policymakers, who are expected to go ahead with the first of at least three US rate hikes this year.

United States technology stocks lagged broader markets, continuing a selloff sparked by reports of large-scale misuse of Facebook user data.

Shares of Facebook Inc dipped nearly five percent in early trading, continuing a slide that took nearly seven per cent off its share price on Monday. While stocks on Wall Street climbed, Facebook’s drop kept the gains in check.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 165.58 points, or 0.67 per cent, to 24,776.49, the S&P 500 gained 5.78 points, or 0.21 per cent, to 2,718.7 and the Nasdaq Composite added 13.67 points, or 0.19 per cent, to 7,357.91.

There were other tech-related problems, too. An accident involving an Uber test car on Monday which resulted in the first fatality involving a fully autonomous vehicle weighed on Silicon Valley sentiment.

Shares in European chipmakers also faced pressure, while Germany’s SAP declined 0.5 per cent, hit by a knock-on effect from US business software peer Oracle, whose quarterly revenue missed analysts’ estimates.

The United States dollar climbed to a one-week high against the Japanese yen as traders limbered up for the start of a two-day Fed Reserve meeting.

With a quarter-point hike – its sixth since the Fed began raising interest rates in late 2015 – baked into market prices, major currencies were largely moving in ranges.

“Euro/dollar is being buffeted by cross currents, especially as both central banks (Fed and the ECB) are normalizing policy but it needs an unexpected policy action to jolt markets,” said Neil Jones, Mizuho’s London head of currency hedge fund sales.

Markets expect at least two more US rate hikes after today for the rest of the year, although analysts acknowledged that the central bank’s ‘dot plot’ could potentially point to as many as four.

The Fed bets kept long-term US bond yields nudging higher with short-dated yields up too.

The yield on 10-year Treasuries was up at almost 2.89 per cent, six basis points below the four-year high of 2.957 per cent touched a month ago. Two-year notes hit a 9 ½-year high of 2.33 per cent.

Among the major commodities, oil prices jumped in line with the dollar as investors remained wary of growing crude supply although tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran provided some support.

US crude rose 2.43 percent to $63.57 per barrel and Brent was last at $67.55, up 2.27 per cent.

The potential for a trade war cast a shadow over export currencies after US President Donald Trump imposed steep tariffs on steel and aluminum. The government is expected to unveil up to $60 billion in new tariffs on Chinese imports by Friday.

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