London — World stocks set a record high before stalling in Europe on Thursday, as the longest winning streak for Japanese stocks since 1998 and the first close above 23,000 for Wall Street’s Dow index helped to offset nerves in Spain. Traders were marking 30 years to the day since the 1987 Black Monday stock market crash but there could not have been a greater contrast as equity markets have continued to clock up milestone after milestone. The Nikkei enjoyed its 13th consecutive daily rise, helping the MSCI index of global stock markets — now up 17.6% for the year — add to its long list of record highs. It was not all one-way traffic, though. European shares took their biggest tumble in almost two months after a new batch of third-quarter results brought some disappointments, notably from Anglo-Dutch consumer goods titan Unilever, French advertising group Publicis and Germany’s Kion. They then took another lurch lower as signals emerged from Spain that Madrid was gearing up to invok...
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