* Oil prices tumble to 12-year lows
* U.S. indexes end higher after falling much of day
* Pan-European index edges down
* China stocks tumble 5 pct
(Updates with U.S. stock market closing)
By Lewis Krauskopf
NEW YORK, Jan 11 (Reuters) - Wall Street rallied to finish
slightly higher on Monday, steadying after a brutal start to
2016, while beaten-down oil prices plunged further after a fresh
tumble for Chinese stocks.
In a volatile session in which U.S. stocks were lower much
of the day, the S&P 500 and the Dow rallied to close higher
after last week posting their worst-ever five-day starts to the
year.
China's main stock indexes .SSEC .CSI300 each dropped
more than 5 percent on Monday. Oil prices fell to new 12-year
lows, as concerns over China hurt commodity prices broadly.
Noting that weak signs out of China and falling oil prices
have recently pressured stocks, Chuck Carlson, chief executive
officer at Horizon Investment Services in Hammond, Indiana,
said: "You had both those things happen today and the market
managed to finish upward.
"The fact that it did hold up for the same reasons that it
seemed to go down last week, that's a victory," Carlson said.
"Today was kind of a nice, perhaps, first brick in the bottom
being put in place."
The Dow Jones industrial average .DJI gained 52.12 points,
or 0.32 percent, to 16,398.57, the S&P 500 .SPX was up 1.64
points, or 0.09 percent, to 1,923.67 and the Nasdaq Composite
.IXIC lost 5.64 points, or 0.12 percent, to 4,637.99.
Energy shares .SPNY led declines, while the healthcare
sector .SPXHC fell 1.2 percent as Celgene Corp CELG.O
weighed after posting a disappointing financial outlook.
Investors were looking to U.S. corporate earnings to help
provide confidence, with major banks reporting later this week,
despite expectations for a second consecutive quarter of overall
declining earnings.
"We are going to start to get into earnings season and that
is going to begin to be the bigger cue for this market," Carlson
said.
The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index .FTEU3 gave up
initial gains and ended down 0.4 percent as commodity shares
tracked oil and metals prices lower.
MSCI's broadest gauge of stocks globally .MIWD00000PUS
slipped 0.4 percent after registering its biggest weekly decline
in more than four years.
Oil prices fell for a sixth straight session to start the
new year, as traders cited fears over slowing demand in China.
U.S. crude prices CLc1 settled down 5.3 percent at $31.41
a barrel, while benchmark Brent LCOc1 dropped 6 percent to
$31.55 a barrel.
"The focus is still on China and the demand concerns in
China moving forward into 2016," said Tony Headrick, an energy
market analyst at CHS Hedging LLC.
The U.S. dollar was up 0.3 percent against a basket of
currencies .DXY , while the euro fell 0.7 percent against the
dollar EUR= .
"Modestly improved risk sentiment was enough to cause the
euro to lose some ground against the U.S. dollar," said Joe
Manimbo, senior market analyst at Western Union Business
Solutions in Washington.
U.S. Treasury yields inched higher in volatile trading.
Benchmark 10-year notes US10YT=RR were down 12/32 in price to
yield 2.1736 percent, from 2.131 percent late on Friday.
Copper prices CMCU3 fell 2.2 percent to 6-1/2-year lows as
the Chinese stock declines reinforced worries about demand in
the world's biggest consumer of industrial metals.
Spot gold XAU= fell 0.8 percent but still hovered at more
than two-month highs.
The 19-market Thomson Reuters CoreCommodity Index .TRJCRB
sank 2.6 percent to a 13-1/2-year low.
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China's volatile markets http://link.reuters.com/myh35w
Currencies vs dollar http://link.reuters.com/tak27s
Oil prices http://link.reuters.com/beb23v
Commodities performance http://link.reuters.com/rac73w
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