Europe shares turn positive

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - European shares turned positive in mid-morning trade on Monday, tracking a tick-up in U.S. stocks index futures. At 10:21 a.m., the FTSEurofirst 300 <.FTEU3> index of top European shares was up 0.2 percent at 841.51 points, having fallen as much as 1.5 percent in early dealings on the back of Wall Street losses on Friday and weak Asian stock markets on Monday.

"One should remain 'overweight' stocks and be buying the dips," JPMorgan said in a European equity strategy note.

Banks <.SX7P> added most points to the European benchmark index, with KBC <KBC.BR> up 10 percent, UniCredit <CRDI.MI> up 8.7 percent, Standard Chartered <STAN.L> up 4.3 percent, HSBC <HSBA.L> up 3 percent, Barclays <BARC.L> up 1.8 percent and UBS <UBSN.VX> up 1.0 percent.

Mining <.SXPP> was the weakest sector, tracking lower metal prices. Shanghai copper fell nearly 2 percent as investors worried that an oversupply may be emerging in China.

Rio Tinto <RIO.L> dropped 4.6 percent, Xtrata <XTA.L> was down 4.7 percent and Anglo American <AAL.L> fell 2.7 percent.

(Reporting by Peter Starck, editing by Atul Prakash)

Article Published: 18/05/2009