MORNING BID EUROPE-EU eyes aid pledges in migrant dilemma

* A look at the day ahead from European Economics and Politics Editor Mark John and EMEA Markets Editor Mike Dolan. The views expressed are their own.

LONDON, Nov 11 (Reuters) - European and African leaders gather in Malta today for talks aimed at stemming the flow of migrants across the Mediterranean, with the European side ready to make cash and aid pledges to improve the lot of Africans contemplating a better life in Europe. The summit suffers somewhat from a timing lag as it was originally conceived after more than 800 perished in the sinking of a boat from Libya earlier this year; since then the focus of the problem has shifted to Syria. One of the goals of the summit is to work out deals to send home hundreds of thousands of Africans already in Europe.

As expected, Portugal's minority government fell last night. We had a scoop saying Canadian ratings agency DBRS will be taking Portugal's political crisis into account when it reviews its debt later this week. That's important because DBRS is the last of the main agencies to rank Portugal as investment grade. If it downgrades, that could see its debt kicked out of the ECB's bond-buying programme. All eyes are now on the country's 76-year-old president Anibal Cavaco Silva and whether he will turn to leftists to have a go at forming a government.

A seemingly anodyne aside by British PM David Cameron yesterday that he was open to options on how to limit immigration by EU nationals has been interpreted as a "wobble" by the local media. "Cameron blinks first", said one headline. Really? It (Other OTC: ITGL - news) was inevitable that Cameron would take flak as soon as he formally unveiled his starting point in negotiations, so we shouldn't be too surprised. The question is to what extent this will fire up the eurosceptics in his own party and be used by the "out" campaign.

MARKETS (AT 0745 GMT)

China's latest health check has left markets equivocal, with another disappointing industrial reading offset by decent retail growth, very much in line with the government's rebalancing message but within a couple of tenths of percentage points of forecasts and so no game-changer. After a couple of days of baking in Fed hike expectations post payrolls, there's a been an uneasy lull over proceedings. ECB easing reports saw euro/dollar take a brief lunge below $1.07, but even that's been unwound overnight and we're back above $1.0740. European markets will look to the British jobs report later to gauge how soon the Bank of England will follow any Fed hike, with Mario Draghi and Mark Carney also speaking at the BoE's open forum on financial regulation later. A flat session for Wall St equities overnight was followed by something similar across the main Asia bourses. Wall St and Eurostocks futures show little new direction yet in pre-market trade. Copper's continued slide to its lowest since August is eye-catching in the commodities area, but Brent crude has held steady above $47. The dollar index and Treasury yields are lower, although the 10-year bund/Tnote spread has widened out to its biggest since May at 1.696 pct points. Portuguese yields stabilized after the government's collapse. DBRS, the only rating agency still to have Portugal's sovereign debt on investment grade and hence qualifying it for ECB QE, said it would take political developments into account as it reviewed the rating later this week.

EVENTS/THEMES

- European corp events - Unicredit (EUREX: DE000A163206.EX - news) , Tod's, Yoox, Endesa (Other OTC: ELEZF - news) , Tullow Oil (LSE: TLW.L - news) , Barratt, Ahold, Deutsche Post (Other OTC: DPSGY - news) , Carlsberg (Other OTC: CABGY - news) , K&S, EON (Taiwan OTC: 3411.TWO - news) , Henkel (Other OTC: HELKF - news)

- German 5-yr bund auction

- UK jobless, earnings

- Sweden, Norway govt bond auctions

- Sweden's Oct (HKSE: 3366-OL.HK - news) jobless rate

- ECB's Draghi and BoE's Carney speak in London as part of BoE open forum on financial regulation

- Riksbank executive board meets for non-rate setting meeting

- Croatia rate decision

- Turkey current account (Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)