GLOBAL MARKETS-Stocks slip towards two-month lows, dollar steadies

* Crude steadies near 7-year lows, saps risk sentiment
* European markets sag, Wall Street set for subdued start
* Dollar climbs, euro falls, Swissie rises on steady SNB
* Kiwi, Aussie firm on RBNZ statement, Australia jobs report
* Sterling dips as Bank of England stays dovish

By Marc Jones
LONDON, Dec 10 (Reuters) - A fourth straight day of falls
nudged stocks towards two-month lows on Thursday, as ricocheting
commodity prices, a jumpy dollar and an extra helping of
emerging market uncertainty made for a jittery global mood.
Oil prices, whose sharp decline has been a big driver of
recent volatility, were fighting for their first rise of the
week, but with so much else tumbling the so-called global "fear"
gauge, the VIX .VIX , climbed to its highest in almost a month.
European shares .FTEU3 teetered on the brink of a third
day of losses and it was touch and go whether Wall Street would
make it a fourth day in a row as S&P 500 ESc1 and Dow 1YMc1
futures prices faded back to almost flat. .N
The dollar .DXY edged higher as traders, eyeing next
week's expected increase in U.S. interest rates, took advantage
of its dip over the last month. FRX/
That in turn took the wind out of the resurgent euro's
EUR= sails, while the Swiss franc EURCHF= rose to a one-week
high against the euro after the Swiss National Bank steered
clear of any changes in its already deeply negative rates.
ID:nL8N13Z1BR
"In general there is some excitement on where to position
ahead of the Fed's meeting," Rabobank strategist Philip Marey
said. "We also have crude prices which are doing some pretty
amazing things at the moment and which are having an impact on
the inflation outlook again."
Oil was slipping about all over the place again. Brent
LCOc1 and U.S. WTI CLc1 crude rose and fell and rose again
to fetch $40.44 and $37.33 a barrel respectively, not far from
this week's seven-year lows. O/R
They found support after U.S. inventories USOILC=ECI fell
for the first time in 11 weeks and a 20 percent jump in vehicle
sales in China, the world's second-biggest oil user, boosted
hopes of more demand in the coming months. ID:nB9N13W00G
Oil's stabilisation helped nudge U.S. government bond yields
up, but in Europe two-year German yields touched their lowest
levels since last week's ECB disappointment, a sign that
investors are not ruling out further easing from Frankfurt.
Finland's ECB policymaker, Erkki Liikanen, fanned those
hopes, saying the bank stood ready to take additional action if
necessary. But one of the bank's main hawks, Yves Mersch,
countered by saying that most ECB Governing Council members
didn't want further stimulus. ID:nF9N13402V ID:nF9N13402T

SUBMERGING MARKETS
With focus already intense on what is expected to be the
first rise in U.S. interest rates in almost a decade next week,
traders were waiting on the final batch of weekly jobless claims
before the decision plus a flurry of other economic data.
ECONG7
Sterling fell after the Bank of England, one of the few
other developed economy candidates to potentially raise rates
next year, showed little sign of doing it any time soon at its
final 2015 meeting. ID:nL8N13Z2R3
In Asia overnight, MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific
shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS shed 0.1 percent.
Japan's Nikkei .N225 closed down 1.3 percent at a five-week
low and Australian shares .AXJO ended down 0.8 percent.
Chinese shares also gave up early gains, with the CSI300
.CSI300 closing 0.35 percent in the red. Hong Kong, Indonesia
and Korea all finished down too.
"The process of taking money off the table is likely to be
driven by nervousness ahead of the U.S. Federal Reserve's moves
next week, along with the soft oil price being viewed as a
barometer of future economic activity," White Funds Management
managing director, Angus Gluskie, said.
Emerging markets had a host of difficult news to deal with.
South Africa's rand ZAR= crumbled 1.7 percent to a new
record low and the cost of insuring its debt against default hit
its highest since early 2009 after President Jacob Zuma removed
Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene from his position.
ID:nL8N13Y4O6
Nene's dismissal comes on the heels of a credit rating
downgrade to just one notch above junk by Fitch last Friday.
South Africa's economy is barely growing and is being squeezed
by lower commodity prices globally.
Concerns were also mounting for Brazil. Moody's put its
credit rating on review for a possible downgrade to junk due to
its a severe recession, failed austerity efforts and rising
risks of political paralysis. ID:nL3N13Y52J
Emerging Asia currencies had the added pressure of another
fall in China's yuan CNY=CFXS . It dropped 0.2 percent to
6.4411 per dollar, its weakest showing since Aug. 13 in the
aftermath of China's unexpected devaluation.
The People's Bank of China set its daily guidance rate at
its lowest in more than four years, adding to speculation that
Beijing will leave the yuan to slide for a while.
"I'm not surprised that more weakening of CNY (yuan) is
here," Nordea Markets senior analyst Amy Yuan Zhuang said.
Another notable mover was the Australian dollar, which
soared after the latest jump in jobs numbers notched the
strongest two-month total for 28 years and pushed unemployment
to a 19-month low of 5.8 percent. ID:nL3N13X1PJ

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Global assets in 2015 http://link.reuters.com/dub25t
Currencies vs dollar http://link.reuters.com/tak27s
Commodities performance http://link.reuters.com/rac73w
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