Global stocks struggle, dollar gains ahead of Fed decision.

LONDON (Reuters) - European stock markets retreated from 20-month highs and the dollar inched up on Wednesday as investors pondered the chances of another rise in U.S. interest rates next month ahead of the Federal Reserve's May statement.

Since December, the U.S. central bank has finally begun to deliver on long-disappointed expectations of a steady rise in borrowing costs and an increase in official rates June is now almost 60 percent priced in by markets.

But U.S. economic numbers in the past month have been less convincing, and the latest gains for global share prices look as much the product of an improving recovery in Europe as the U.S.-based optimism that dominated the end of last year.


By Patrick Graham.
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