Financials help European shares to hit 2-week high

(Corrects para 1 to read "two-week")

* Europe's STOXX 600 index hits 2-week high

* Banks among top gainers, miners slip

* Ackermans & Van Haaren (LSE: 0GYM.L - news) falls after weak H1

By Kit Rees

LONDON, Aug 30 (Reuters) - European equities climbed to a two-week high on Tuesday, with financial stocks gaining ground on mounting expectations of a possible U.S (Other OTC: UBGXF - news) . rate hike this year.

The European Banks index rose 1.8 percent, the top sectoral gainer, helped by a 2.7 to 3.8 percent rise in shares of Deutsche Bank (LSE: 0H7D.L - news) , ABN Amro, Natixis (LSE: 0IHK.L - news) and Credit Suisse (LSE: 0QP5.L - news) .

Banks benefit from higher interest rates, which can boost margins. Although interest rates in Europe are likely to remain at ultra-low levels for an extended period, some European lenders have business in the United States and a U.S. rate hike could help.

Investors are eyeing Friday's U.S. non-farm payrolls data for any clues about the timing of a rate hike.

"We have adjusted our forecast for the U.S. economy downward after the unexpectedly weak second-quarter GDP figure. In recent weeks, however, economic signals have been predominantly positive," said Robert Bergqvist, chief economist at SEB (LSE: 0MGS.L - news) .

"The U.S. Federal Reserve will be alone in raising its key rate this coming December."

Banks helped the pan-European STOXX 600 to close 0.5 percent higher, after rising earlier in the session to its highest level since mid-August.

Miners lost ground again as metals prices slipped following a rise in the U.S. dollar on higher rate expectations. A stronger dollar makes metals costlier for holders of other currencies and lowers demand for raw materials.

Among some sharp movers, Germany's Wirecard (LSE: 0O8X.L - news) jumped 3 percent after Barclays (LSE: BARC.L - news) raised its rating on the stock to "overweight" from "equal weight" and lifted its target price.

"Wirecard is not without controversy, but over the last decade it has built a strong strategic position both from a product and regional perspective and is well positioned in terms of our acquiring framework, in our view," analysts at Barclays (Swiss: BARC.SW - news) said in a note.

The STOXX 600 Basic Resources (Frankfurt: W8Z.F - news) index fell 3 percent, making the sector the worst-performing in Europe, with shares in Anglo American (LSE: AAL.L - news) , Rio Tinto (LSE: RIO.L - news) , Fresnillo (Amsterdam: FN6.AS - news) and Glencore (Frankfurt: 8GC.F - news) falling 4.3 to 5.6 percent.

Belgian investment holding company Ackermans & Van Haaren dropped 6.6 percent after reporting a weak set of first-half results.

(Additional reporting by Atul Prakash; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Andrew Roche)