A look at the day ahead in European and global markets from Tom

Westbrook

Notwithstanding fresh hostilities in the Middle East, AI

shares drove equity markets in Asia to new records on Wednesday.

AI kingmaker Jensen Huang - the CEO of Nvidia ( NVDA ) -

offered the latest shove higher by anointing superhero-sounding

chipmaker Marvell Technology ( MRVL ) as the next

trillion-dollar company, promptly sending its stock price up

more than 30%.

A market cap of $254 billion is a long way from $1 trillion,

but that's a gap that peers have been covering at a clip. A year

ago Micron and SK Hynix had market values of

barely $100 billion. They now top $1 trillion.

Memory-maker Kioxia ( KXHCF ) also briefly on Wednesday

became Japan's second-most valuable company behind tech investor

SoftBank, pushing longtime No. 1 Toyota ( TM ) into

third position.

In a surprise move ahead of its investor roadshow, Elon

Musk's SpaceX plans to fix its IPO price at $135 ‌per share to

raise a record-setting $75 billion, according to a source

familiar with the matter.

Elsewhere in markets, the yen tiptoed into the

intervention red zone on Wednesday, touching the 160-per-dollar

level that's viewed as around authorities' red line.

Gulf hostilities flared anew, with the U.S. military saying

Iranian missile attacks on Bahrain, Kuwait and other regional

targets were either thwarted or failed, as diplomacy between

Washington and Tehran showed little progress.

Oil prices rose by around $1 a barrel.

The U.S. services ISM is due later in the day, along with

private payrolls and the Federal Reserve's beige book of

economic conditions ahead of U.S. labour data due out on Friday.

Figures on Tuesday showed job openings increased by the most

in five years in April.

Key developments that could influence markets on Wednesday:

- Economics: U.S. services ISM, ADP Payrolls, Fed beige book

- Iran war developments

(Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)