* September U.S. interest rate 'lift-off' back on table
* Oil hits multi-month lows on U.S. gasoline build worries
* Dollar teeters on rate-hike view
(Adds oil settlement prices)
By Herbert Lash
NEW YORK, Aug 5 (Reuters) - Stocks rose on Wednesday, lifted
by data showing the pace of growth in the U.S. service sector
surged in July to its best level in a decade and solid corporate
results in Europe, while the dollar teetered as investors
weighed the possibility of a September rate hike.
The U.S. Institute for Supply Management's services sector
index rose to 60.3, its highest reading since August 2005, on
sharp increases in business activity, employment and new orders.
It beat expectations of a 56.2 reading.
The data backed views the Federal Reserve will raise
interest rates in September after weaker-than-expected private
hiring figures for July released earlier on Wednesday kindled
doubts about a rate hike next month.
"For most people watching the market, whether it's September
or December isn't that critical, most people are assuming it
will happen this year. They've already factored that in to the
way they look at the market," said Rick Meckler, president of
hedge fund LibertyView Capital Management LLC in Jersey City,
New Jersey.
The dollar was supported by comments from Atlanta Federal
Reserve President Dennis Lockhart, regarded as a centrist
policymaker, who put September back on the table for the first
U.S. rate rise in almost a decade in an interview on Tuesday .
Lockhart told The Wall Street Journal it would take
"significant deterioration" in the U.S. economy for him to not
support a rate hike next month.
Against the yen JPY= , the greenback rose to a two-month
high, gaining 0.33 percent to 124.79. The U.S. dollar index
.DXY slipped 0.06 percent at 97.876.
In equity markets, the Dow Jones industrial average .DJI
rose 15.2 points, or 0.09 percent, to 17,565.89. The S&P 500
.SPX gained 10.14 points, or 0.48 percent, to 2,103.46 and the
Nasdaq Composite .IXIC added 46.37 points, or 0.91 percent, to
5,151.91.
Stocks gained more than 1.0 percent in Europe, with the
pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index .FTEU3 closing up 1.31
percent at 1,601.66. MSCI's all-country world stock index
.MIWD00000PUS rose 0.33 percent.
Societe Generale SOGN.PA shares jumped 7.9 percent after
the French bank became the latest major European company to post
forecast-beating earnings, while regional automakers, which fell
in late July on concerns about a slowing China, rallied. The
STOXX Europe index .SXAP of 15 companies rose 2.5 percent.
In debt markets, U.S. Treasuries prices fell, while a
sell-off in European bonds accelerated, after the strong ISM
report.
The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note fell 15/32 in price
to yield 2.2645 percent.
German 10-year yields DE10YT=TWEB , the euro zone's
benchmark, jumped 12 basis points to 0.75 percent.
Oil prices hit multi-month lows on a surge in U.S. gasoline
stockpiles as the summer season, the country's biggest demand
period for motor fuels, neared its end.
Futures of Brent, the global oil benchmark, hit a six-month
bottom while U.S. crude touched a 4-1/2-month trough, ignoring a
bigger-than-expected drawdown in U.S. crude stockpiles announced
by the Energy Information Administration.
September Brent crude oil futures LCOc1 fell 40 cents to
settle at $49.59 a barrel. U.S. crude for September delivery
CLc1 settled down 59 cents at $45.15 a barrel.
(Editing by Larry King and Meredith Mazzilli; To read Reuters