European stocks climbed, while the euro dropped to the lowest level in more than 11 years, after the European Central Bank said it will start wider asset purchases next week. A report showed initial jobless claims increased to 320,000 in the latest week, up from 313,000 in the prior week, and exceeding the 295,000 forecast. That heightened expectations for Friday's jobs report, which is expected to show payrolls rose by 235,000 last month while the jobless rate declined to 5.6 percent. "We're kind of tapping our foot for tomorrow's non-farm payroll," Brian Battle, director of trading at Performance Trust Capital Partners, in Chicago, told Reuters. "The Federal Reserve made it very clear they're going to raise rates but its going to be data dependent. It's one of the benchmark numbers they're looking at."
