* Wall Street dips after four-week S&P 500 rally
* Oil falls on supply glut concerns
* Dollar falls after U.S. housing data
(Adds U.S. markets open, changes byline, dateline; previous
LONDON)
By Chuck Mikolajczak
NEW YORK, Oct 26 (Reuters) - Global equity markets slipped
on Monday, pausing after a four-week rally ahead of policy
announcements from central banks in the U.S. and Japan later in
the week, while the dollar lost ground in the wake of soft U.S.
housing data.
Investors had recently raised bets that Japan's
already-massive stimulus would be further increased after China
cut interest rates last week and the European Central Bank
indicated it may add to its asset purchase program in December.
But comments Monday by a key economic adviser to Prime
Minister Shinzo Abe, who said the Bank of Japan did not need to
boost its monetary stimulus this week, cooled those expectations
somewhat.
The U.S. Federal Reserve, meanwhile, which will issue a
policy statement at the conclusion of a two-day meeting on
Wednesday, is increasingly expected to hold off its first rate
hike in nearly a decade until next year.
U.S. stocks dipped, with the PHLX housing index .HGX down
1 percent after the Commerce Department said new U.S.
single-family home sales fell to near a one-year low in
September after two straight months of gains.
"Basically, what we are seeing here is a market that is
subject to slight profit taking after strong gains registered
last week," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at
Rockwell Global Capital in New York.
"We had new home sales which came down rather sharply and
that is another reason to be somewhat cautious."
FOUR-WEEK RALLY
After a gain of more than 7 percent over the past four
weeks, MSCI's all-country world index .MIWD00000PUS of the
equity performance of 46 countries shed 0.05 percent, while the
pan-regional FTSEurofirst 300 .FTEU3 index in Europe fell 0.3
percent.
Shares in European markets were mostly lower, but Germany's
DAX .GDAXI outperformed with a 0.2 percent gain after a
business sentiment survey showed that morale had fallen by less
than expected in October.
The Dow Jones industrial average .DJI fell 4.68 points, or
0.03 percent, to 17,642.02, the S&P 500 .SPX lost 3.09 points,
or 0.15 percent, to 2,072.06 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC
added 8.59 points, or 0.17 percent, to 5,040.45.
About 170 companies in the S&P 500 are expected to report
earnings this week, including Apple Inc AAPL.O on Tuesday.
Thomson Reuters data shows third-quarter earnings are
expected to decrease 2.8 percent from a year ago, a slight
improvement from the 3.9 percent decline expected a week
earlier.
The dollar .DXY was off 0.3 percent to 96.86 against a
basket of major currencies and fell to global session lows
versus the yen in the wake of the housing data.
Crude oil prices fell, with U.S. crude CLc1 off 1 percent
to $44.15 and Brent down 0.8 percent to $47.61 as a global
supply glut pushes fuel storage sites close to capacity, and
with fewer speculators willing to bet on a rise in crude prices.
Prices on 10-year Treasuries US10YT=RR were up 6/32 in
price to yield 2.0635 percent.
(Editing by Bernadette Baum)