By Soumyajit Saha
July 2 (Reuters) - Australian shares were set to open higher on Thursday after Wall Street gained overnight on promising results from a coronavirus vaccine trial, and on encouraging economic data from top economy United States and largest trading partner China.
A COVID-19 vaccine developed by pharmaceutical giant Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) PFE.N and Germany's BioNTech BNTX.O showed potential and was found to be well tolerated in early-stage human trials, and different sets of data from the top two economies showed factory activity rise in both the United States and China in June. local share price index futures YAPcm1 rose 0.7%, a 10.6-point premium to the underlying S&P/ASX 200 index .AXJO close. The benchmark rose 0.6% on Thursday.
New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index .NZ50 rose 0.4% in early trade.