* Global stocks rise for second day in a row
* Oil making a "fool" of forecasters
* Sterling, Aussie the big gainers in FX
By Jamie McGeever
LONDON, May 17 (Reuters) - World shares rose on Tuesday as
technology giant Apple Inc's biggest rise in over two months and
oil's march higher to near $50 a barrel boosted investor demand
for riskier assets at the expense of safe-haven bonds.
MSCI's index of global shares rose 0.2 percent
.MIWD00000PUS , putting it on track for its second consecutive
rise, something it has not managed in a month.
Europe's major stock markets rose as much as 1 percent
before easing back, following similar gains in Asia after Wall
Street had also chalked up a 1 percent rise on Monday.
The rally lost some steam, however, and U.S. stock futures
pared earlier gains to signal a rise of around 0.1 percent at
the open on Wall Street.
"Markets are once again up on higher commodity prices.
Nevertheless, we should not get carried away and chase the
commodity complex higher as most of these markets are still very
much over-supplied," Philippe Gijsels, head of research at BNP
Paribas Fortis, said.
Brent crude oil futures rose to their highest level in
almost six months, within a few cents of breaking above $50 for
the first time since Nov. 4, before drifting back below $49 by
midday in Europe.
At 1100 GMT, the FTSEuroFirst 300 index of leading European
shares was up 0.5 percent at 1,321 points .FTEU3 , with
Germany's DAX up 0.2 percent .GDAXI , France's CAC 40 up 0.1
percent .FCHI and Britain's FTSE 100 .FTSE gaining 0.5
percent.
The basic resources sector .SXPP was among the biggest
sectoral gainers, up 1 percent.
Earlier in Asia, MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific
shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS rose 0.9 percent, extending
its recovery from a two-month low set on Friday. Japan's Nikkei
.N225 gained about 1.1 percent.
FOOL'S BLACK GOLD
Oil's rise to six-month highs came as supply disruptions
prompted long-time bear Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) to issue a bullish
assessment on near-term prices. Goldman has long warned of
global storage hitting capacity and of another oil price crash
to as low as $20 per barrel.
A combination of Nigerian, Venezuelan and other outages,
declining U.S. production, and virtually frozen inflows of
Canadian crude after wildfires in Alberta's oil sands region all
helped to lift oil prices.
"The oil market continues to make an even larger fool of
most forecasters than other financial assets: having caught
everyone out by plummeting, it is now catching us out by
continuing to rise," Rabobank analysts wrote.
Brent crude futures LCOc1 rose as high as $49.31 per
barrel on Tuesday, after having risen 2.4 percent on Monday,
touching $49.47, the highest since early November. By midday,
however, they had slipped back to $48.84.
U.S. crude's West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures CLc1
rose to $48.42 before giving back most of that rise, having
risen 3.3 percent on Monday.
Shares in Apple AAPL.O finished 3.7 percent higher on
Monday after Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRKa) BRKa.N
reported taking a stake of about $1 billion in the iPhone maker.
Apple shares had lost about one-fifth of their value in the past
month on worries about the company's slowing sales growth.
In the currency market, the British pound rose 0.6 percent
to $1.45 GBP=D4 helped in part by a report that the "In"
campaign held a 15-point lead over rival "Out" ahead of
Britain's June 23 referendum on European Union membership.
The dollar was little changed against the euro at $1.1320
EUR= , but rose 0.5 percent against the yen to 109.50 yen
JPY= as investors took a 'risk on' stance on Tuesday.
The Australian dollar rose 1 percent to a high of $0.7366
AUD=D4 , its best day in over a month, after minutes of the
Reserve Bank of Australia's May policy meeting were less dovish
in tone than many investors had expected.
Bond yields were mostly higher, with U.S. yields up a basis
point across the curve US2YT=RR US10YT=RR and benchmark euro
zone yields up around 2 basis points EU2YT=RR EU10YT=RR .
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Shanghai CSI 300 and global effects interactive https://t.co/YqIYLIbInP
Chinese A-shares vs developed and emerging stocks http://link.reuters.com/rac25w
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