* Dollar falls hard as Fed scales back rate hike expectations
* World shares hit highest since start of year
* European shares swoon as exporters wince at higher euro
* U.S. crude, Brent continue to rise
* Emerging market shares jump 3 percent (Updates with U.S. prices, changes comment, dateline; previous LONDON)
By Rodrigo Campos
NEW YORK, March 17 (Reuters) - The U.S. dollar index dropped to a five-month low on Thursday while shares in major markets were on track to close at their highest level of the year as a dovish U.S. Federal Reserve emboldened investors to take in more risk.
Traders continued to digest the previous day's statement and projections from the Fed, which scaled down to two its expectations of the number of U.S. rate hikes likely over the next nine months. It previously estimated four hikes through 2016. the dollar declined, commodity prices rose to their highest this year .TRJCRB , as did stocks across emerging markets .MSCIEF . Those heavily reliant on manufactured exports, like the Japanese market and European automakers, fell.
On Wall Street, miners were boosted by stronger commodity prices.
"Risk is thoroughly on," said Kit Juckes, Societe Generale (PA:SOGN) global head of currency strategy. "All the chit-chat was that they (the Fed) were going to be hawkish, and they weren't.
"The dollar is obviously the loser, but it's good for shares, it's good for oil..."
The Dow Jones industrial average .DJI rose 86.98 points, or 0.5 percent, to 17,412.74, the S&P 500 .SPX gained 6.56 points, or 0.32 percent, to 2,033.78 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC dropped 5.62 points, or 0.12 percent, to 4,758.35.
Despite Europe's .FTEU3 0.5 percent decline, MSCI's 46-country share index .MIWD00000PUS climbed 1.2 percent on the day to reach its highest since Jan. 4, the opening trading day for most markets this year.
A more than 3 percent surge catapulted emerging market stocks .MSCIEF to their highest since mid-December. Stocks in Brazil .BVSP rose 5.5 percent, the most for any day since late October 2009.
The jump in the yen, however, meant Japan's Nikkei .N225 lost out, and it closed down 0.2 percent. Dollar-denominated Nikkei futures NKc1 fell 1.4 percent.
A MATERIALS WORLD
Copper prices CMCU3 briefly hit their highest since November, and were last up more than 2 percent.
Brent oil LCOc1 jumped above $41 a barrel as a number of large producers also nailed down a date to discuss an output freeze. U.S. crude CLc1 flirted with $40 and was up 3.3 percent at $39.73.
"For now, the (oil) market is staying well supported, and the dollar is proving additional support," said Olivier Jakob, oil analyst at Petromatrix. "It will be difficult to return to the lows of the year."
An index of prices across the commodity complex .TRJCRB rose 1.5 percent to the highest level this year.
In currency markets, the dollar sank against the euro, yen and Swiss franc. The dollar index .DXY touched its lowest since October.
Against the yen JPY= , the greenback touched its lowest since October 2014. The sharp move triggered market chatter that the Bank of Japan had been speaking to dealers about activity in the yen, but several traders contacted by Reuters said they did not have any indication the central bank was intervening.
"It would be a bit strange for the BoJ to start intervening," said Charles St-Arnaud, senior strategist and economist at Nomura International in London. "You're just a month after the G20 where (Japan) pledged not to use competitive devaluation to their advantage and to let market forces determine the currency."
Benchmark 10-year note US10YT=RR yields fell to one-week lows, while U.S. two-year notes US2YT=RR , the maturity most sensitive to Fed rate expectations, slid to a two-week trough.
The 10-year note was last up 10/32 to yield 1.9029 percent, compared with 1.938 percent late on Wednesday.