* Oil climbs as U.S. and Iran trade attacks in the Gulf

* S&P 500 futures slip, Nikkei loses 1%

* Dollar edges up as market narrows odds on Fed rate hike

* Fed chair to testify this week, US CPI in focus

By Wayne Cole

SYDNEY, July 13 (Reuters) - Share markets slipped in Asia on

Monday as fighting intensified in the Gulf and Iran claimed to

have closed the vital Strait of Hormuz, sending oil prices

surging and rekindling inflation risks globally.

The dollar gained with bond yields as investors nudged up

the chance of a hike in interest rates from the Federal Reserve,

just a day before Chair Kevin Warsh is due to face Congress for

the first time in his new role.

Inflation figures for June on Tuesday could show some

cooling in the headline rate of 4.2% as petrol prices decline,

though some of that will reverse now that oil is rising anew.

Brent crude climbed 3.3% in early trade to reach

$78.50 a barrel, up from the recent trough of $70.14, while U.S.

crude added 3.4% to $73.83 a barrel.

U.S. officials said around 20 vessels had been escorted

through the strait in the previous 24 hours, though ship

tracking sites showed little traffic moving.

Equity investors will be hoping the earnings season proves

as upbeat as forecast with the major banks kicking off from

Tuesday, while Netflix ( NFLX ) and General Electric ( GE ) are

also on the docket.

"Tech continues to screen highly in our models, supported by

stand out earnings growth/momentum and attractive valuations,"

wrote analysts at Citi in a note.

"While AI volatility may remain elevated over the coming

quarter, we maintain our Overweight stance on global IT and the

U.S.," they added. "We pair these growth exposures with over

weights in cyclical regions/sectors, including Japan, financials

and materials."

Early action saw S&P 500 futures ease 0.3%, while

Nasdaq futures lost 0.5%. Japan's Nikkei fell

1.0%, having shed 1.7% last week, while MSCI's broadest index of

Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan fell 0.2%.

TESTING THE CHIP BUBBLE

South Korea's red-hot market eased 0.4%, and will be

in focus having shed almost 8% last week as leveraged bets on

semiconductor shares came under pressure. The market has

recently become something of a bellwether for the chip sector

globally and further losses could ripple out more broadly.

South Korean chipmaker SK Hynix's U.S.-listed

shares jumped almost 14% in their Nasdaq debut on Friday. News

that Apple ( AAPL ) had sued OpenAI and two former employees for

trade secrets theft emerged after markets closed.

The spike in oil pushed 10-year Treasury yields

up 2 basis points to 4.59%, while Fed fund futures

slipped 2 ticks, implying 34 basis points of policy tightening

by the end of the year.

That in turn kept the dollar index firm at 101.12.

The euro eased a fraction to $1.1403 as Europe is far

more reliant on foreign oil than the U.S.

The dollar added 0.1% on the yen to 161.96,

regaining some of the ground lost on Friday when Japanese

Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama floated an idea to encourage

the $1.8 trillion Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF) and

other retirement vehicles to bring some of their money home.

"The GPIF currently allocates 50/50 between domestic and

offshore and a move back even to the pre-pandemic norm closer to

60/40 would come with a large JPY buying flow," said Taylor

Nugent, a senior economist at NAB.

"It is worth noting though that while allocations can

theoretically be reviewed any time, they tend to be slow moving,

and the FY26 investment plan is already in place."

In commodity markets, the rise in yields weighed on

non-interest bearing gold which slipped 1.1% to $4,076 an ounce

.