(Updates with European market moves ahead of BoE rate decision)

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European shares hit record high

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Bank of England expected to cut interest rates

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Slew of corporate earnings on tap

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Treasury yields ease up from 1-month lows

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Yen strengthens on bets of more BOJ hikes

By Marc Jones

LONDON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - European shares hit a record

high, gold was near one of its own all-time peaks and bond

markets were back under pressure on Thursday as traders turned

their focus back to where global interest rates are heading

after days of trade war angst.

Britain's pound was sliding ahead of a widely-expected Bank

of England rate cut later, but Europe's shares were buoyant

again as encouraging earnings from drugmaker AstraZeneca ( AZN )

and miners helped the STOXX 600 up 0.7%.

Wall Street was similarly poised, with S&P 500 futures

and Nasdaq futures gaining more than 0.2% each.

Amazon's ( AMZN ) earnings are due later, with pressure on

for it to deliver on lofty expectations for cloud computing

after lacklustre reports from Microsoft ( MSFT ) and Alphabet

this week.

Ahead of the Bank of England's expected rate cut, Royal

London's Head of Rates and Cash, Craig Inches, said the broader

market barometer had swung back to worrying about global growth

in the last couple of weeks.

That has caused a "washout" for those betting against bonds

and leaves plenty of interest in what BoE chief Andrew Bailey

will say later, given markets have repriced where UK rates are

likely to end up - down to 3.75% from around 4.10% a month ago.

"What we are looking for clues on from Bailey is whether

what we have got priced in is in line with his thinking, or have

we gone too far?" Inches said.

"I think the Bank will want to get itself back in the middle

of the pack" of other European central banks, Inches added,

given that the UK is seeing the "wrong" kind of inflation and

growth is "on its knees".

Though uncertainties remain about new U.S. President Donald

Trump's plans for global trade, the economy and diplomacy,

markets seem for the most part relieved that things haven't been

worse, particularly with regard to tariffs.

China's central bank again set a stronger-than-expected yuan

midpoint fixing overnight, though the currency still weakened

after Beijing sought the World Trade Organization's intervention

to rule on Trump's latest 10% tariffs on Chinese imports.

China's commerce ministry also said on Thursday that Beijing

was ready to work with other countries to jointly respond to the

challenges of unilateralism and trade protectionism, and it

branded U.S. tariffs "vile".

The onshore yuan last stood at 7.2845 per dollar,

while its offshore counterpart eased 0.05% to 7.2862.

Meanwhile, China's CSI300 blue-chip index jumped more

than 1%.

"Chinese authorities at this stage are not indicating or

showing any intention of weakening the yuan as part of the

response to the tariffs. I think that has definitely helped to

calm the market down," said Khoon Goh, head of Asia research at

ANZ.

RATES OUTLOOK

Global government bond yields - a proxy of what countries

pay to borrow - were rising again in Europe after falling to

1-month lows in recent sessions.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had said on Wednesday

that while Trump wants lower interest rates, he will not ask the

Federal Reserve to cut rates.

Bessent also said that he and Trump were intently focused on

the 10-year Treasury yield.

"Certainly those comments were interesting, and perhaps a

little surprising, though (they) likely suggest that Bessent is

having something of a moderating influence on Trump," said

Michael Brown, senior research strategist at Pepperstone.

Futures point to just about 45 basis points worth of easing

from the Fed by the year-end..

In currencies, the dollar was also on the rise again, up

0.4% against a basket of major currencies despite touching an

eight-week low against the yen after the Bank of Japan's Naoki

Tamura advocated continued interest rate hikes.

The euro fell 0.5% to $1.0359, while the looming

Bank of England cut pushed sterling down 0.6% to

$1.2427.

However, the BoE's benchmark Bank Rate currently stands at

4.75%, the highest among the large rich economies. Thursday's

widely expected quarter-point cut would bring it to the same

level as in Norway and close to the U.S. Federal Reserve's

4.25-4.5% range.

In commodities, oil prices rose, steadying from a sell-off

the previous day after Saudi Arabia's state oil company sharply

raised March oil prices.

U.S. crude edged 0.42% higher to $71.33 a barrel,

while Brent crude rose 0.31% to $74.84 per barrel.

Gold eased a touch from a record peak it struck on

Wednesday and was last at $2,860.11 an ounce.

(Additional reporting by Rae Wee in Singapore; editing by

Gareth Jones)