Australia

Australian shares are tipped to climb after a two-day Christmas break, chasing a huge Wall Street rebound fuelled by retail confidence and higher oil prices.

The S&P 500, Nasdaq, and the Dow Jones were up more than 4 per cent each overnight, in the first day of US trading following the Christmas holiday, when the market was closed.

Investors welcomed news that sales during the US holiday shopping season rose 5.1 per cent to over $US850 billion in 2018, while rising oil prices also helped stocks climb back from a Christmas Eve slump.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1086.25 points, or 4.98 per cent, to 22,878.45, the S&P 500 gained 116.6 points, or 4.96 per cent, to 2467.7 and the Nasdaq Composite added 361.44 points, or 5.84 per cent, to 6554.36.

There are signs of progress in the US-China trade talks. A US government delegation will travel to Beijing in the week of 7 January to hold trade talks with Chinese officials, Bloomberg reports.

Oil erased some of the losses that have taken crude benchmarks to lows not seen in 18 months, but gold has pared gains after earlier hitting a six-month peak.

The benchmark ASX/200 closed higher on Christmas Eve thanks to broad-based gains amid light trade, but the local bourse remains on track for a fourth consecutive month in the red, and its worst quarter since September 2011, in a year marked by political and economic uncertainty.

The market has shed 9.42 per cent in 2018 - its worst run in eight years.

The Aussie dollar has been steady over the break and is trading at 70.70 US cents at 8am on Thursday, slightly up from 70.62 US cents on Monday.

ASIA

China stocks slipped on Wednesday amid investor skittishness over the US government shutdown and Donald Trump's threat to oust US Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell.

The blue-chip CSI300 index fell 0.5 per cent, to 3002.03, while the Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.3 per cent to 2498.29 points.

The scheduled trade talks between the US and China will be the first face-to-face meeting the two sides have held since Trump and China's Xi Jinping agreed on a temporary truce in Argentina this month.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said last week the US team and its counterparts have held talks over the phone, Bloomberg reports.

Japan's Nikkei share average closed 0.9 per cent higher at 19,327.06, barely shaking off Tuesday's 5 per cent plunge - the steepest single-day decline in over two years.

The sell-off left the benchmark down about 21 per cent from a 27-year peak scaled in early October, meaning it's still in bear market territory entered during the previous session.

The broader Topix finished 1.1 per cent higher at 1431.47, but remained down 25.1 per cent from a high of 1911.31 hit in late January.

EUROPE

European markets finished mixed as of the most recent closing prices.

The DAX gained 0.21 per cent while the CAC 40 led the FTSE 100 lower. They fell 1.45 per cent and 0.52 per cent respectively.

NORTH AMERICA

The Dow Jones Industrial Average has surged at least 1000 points in a single session for the first time in a broad stock rebound after the benchmark S&P 500 index was on the brink of a bear market.

The three major US indexes all posted their biggest one-day percentage gains since March 2009, in the first day of trading following the Christmas holiday, when the market was closed.

Sales in the 2018 US holiday shopping season rose 5.1 per cent to over $US850 billion, the strongest in six years, according to a Mastercard report. The S&P 500 retailing index jumped 7.4 per cent, while shares of online retailer Amazon, which touted a "record-breaking" season, climbed 9.4 per cent.

Oil prices also surged, boosting sentiment for risk assets such as stocks, while underpinning a 6.2 per cent gain for energy shares.

Stocks found their footing after wobbling in morning trade. The S&P 500 came within 2 points of falling 20 per cent from its late-September closing high, a threshold commonly used to define a bear market.

"The market is extremely oversold where we left it" on Monday, said Brett Ewing, chief market strategist at First Franklin Financial Services in Tallahassee, Florida.

"You cannot make the assumption that this correction is over, but today's action is definitely a very positive signal."

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1086.25 points, or 4.98 per cent, to 22,878.45, the S&P 500 gained 116.6 points, or 4.96 per cent, to 2467.7 and the Nasdaq Composite added 361.44 points, or 5.84 per cent, to 6554.36.

The previous record point gain for the Dow was 936.42 on 13 October 2008, when markets were whipsawed almost daily by developments in the financial crisis, which was then in full swing. Over the two sessions following that gain, the Dow dropped more than 800 points.