While you were sleeping US manufacturing lifts stocks

While you were sleeping US manufacturing lifts stocks
By Margreet Dietz March 18 (BusinessDesk) – Equities on both sides of the Atlantic advanced amid better-than-expected gains in US manufacturing as Federal Reserve policy makers gear up to start their two-day meeting today. A Fed report showed that US factory production climbed 0.8 percent in February, after a 0.9 percent slide in January. The increase beat economists’ estimates. The data underpinned expectations that the US economy is coming out of a harsher-than-usual winter in strong enough shape for Federal Open Market Committee policy ma...