containers are seen at the yangshan deep water port part of the shanghai free trade zone in shanghai china february 13 2017 reutersaly song a look at the day ahead in european and global markets from anshuman daga while global stocks are still hovering near multimonth highs despite a batch of bad economic data from china worries about a sharp slowdown in growth are keeping them rangebound theres near consensus that chinas unexpected move to ease borrowing costs to shore up its faltering economy  hobbled by beijings zerocovid policy  will remain a symbolic move some economists have already pared down their growth projections unless investors see any signs of upturn in the worlds secondlargest economy its hard to see global equities marching upwards though signs of cooling inflation have prompted hopes of less aggressive fed tightening the message from some corporate chiefs however remains bullish bhps bhpax ceo mike henry expects china to emerge as a source of stability for commodity demand in the year ahead and highlighted policy support after the worlds biggest miner posted its strongest profit in 11 years read more for now growth worries are providing some muchneeded respite from soaring commodity prices oil the best performing asset class so far this year is heading lower brent crude futures stayed weak on tuesday after retreating to their lowest in the previous session since before russia sent troops into ukraine on feb 24 meanwhile ukraine called for new sanctions on russia and highlighted the risks and consequences of a catastrophe at europes biggest nuclear plant read more europe is facing soaring energy bills this year driven by a global surge in wholesale power and gas prices benchmark european gas prices at the dutch ttf hub have more than trebled this year partly following supply disruption linked to russias invasion of ukraine read more european stock futures pointed to a steady start for markets with asian stocks underpinned by gains on wall street key developments that could influence markets on tuesday economic data uk unemployment and average earnings german zew survey us building permits and housing starts and industrial production