U.S. equities opened higher following a rally in global markets as fears eased that U.S. President Donald Trump's planned tariffs on aluminum and steel would escalate into a trade war.
The S&P 500 was up 0.24% to 2727.91 and the Nasdaq had gained 1.51% to 7367.78 as of 10:00 a.m. ET on March 6. The yield on 10-year U.S. Treasury notes stood at 2.863% after moving as a high as 2.908 the day before.
European shares also opened higher, but gave up some gains as the trading day progressed. The FTSE 100 was up 0.77%, Germany's DAX rose 0.53% and France's CAC 40 was up 0.44% as of 10:00 a.m. ET. The Stoxx 600 of European stocks added 0.45%.
Italy's FTSE MIB Index jumped 1.88%, recovering after shares fell the prior day after an anti-establishment party finished first in national Italian elections.
"Market reaction while negative was fairly measured largely due to the fact that dysfunctional Italian politics isn't really anything new," said Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets UK, in a note.
"Equity markets also managed to shrug off concerns about a possible escalation in the various threats of trade wars, after some tweets from President Trump that suggested that his threats to slap on tariffs were part of his strategy to speed up progress in the ongoing NAFTA talks," he added.
Asian equities posted sharp gains March 6, led by Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index, which finished up 2.14%. Japan's Nikkei 225 and China's Shanghai Composite Index closed up 1.79% and 1.00%, respectively.
"North American equities started the week on a bright note," TD Securities said in a note, "Markets were able to block out the noise around steel and aluminum tariffs."
But Hewson warned that even if the planned tariffs were merely a tool to sway NAFTA negotiations, "investors might be missing the bigger picture in that this could merely be the start of President Trump's attempts to upend the status quo on global trade in an attempt to make it work better for the U.S. economy."
