Spain's Ibex-35 stock index opened higher on Thursday after three sessions of declines, as plunging oil prices and moderating U.S. jobs data helped push U.S. Treasury yields away from 16-year highs.

However, caution prevailed ahead of Friday's U.S. jobs report, which could provide clues about the Fed's next steps.

The rise in bond prices gave some respite to the markets, after a much less than expected increase in the ADP report on US private sector job creation - which could encourage the Fed not to raise interest rates further - and a 5% drop in oil prices offered some comfort to investors.

Risk appetite has been damaged recently by the idea that rates will remain high for longer than initially expected.

According to analysts at Renta 4, the ADP data shows a "moderation" that could also be seen in Friday's official report -including the public sector-, "where the market expects some softening in the pace of job creation to 170,000 non-farm payrolls (vs. 187,000 previously), with the unemployment rate relatively stable (3.7%e vs. 3.8% previously) and stability also in wage growth, +4.3% y.a.".

"A necessary moderation to bring prices back towards their 2% target in the medium term," Renta 4 said in a note to clients.

On Thursday, the focus will be on US jobless claims (1230 GMT).

At 07:23 GMT on Thursday, Spain's selective Ibex-35 stock market index was up 20.20 points, or 0.22%, to 9,123.10 points, while the FTSE Eurofirst 300 index of large European stocks was up 0.16%.

In the banking sector, Santander rose 0.35%, BBVA gained 0.08%, Caixabank advanced 0.92%, Sabadell gained 0.28%, Bankinter gained 0.53%, and Unicaja Banco rose 0.35%.

Among the large non-financial stocks, Telefónica gained 0.13%, Inditex advanced 0.23%, Iberdrola gained 0.60%, Cellnex fell 0.37%, and the oil company Repsol lost 0.35%.

Among the other electricity companies, Naturgy gained 0.88%, while Endesa advanced 0.81%.

(Report by Benjamín Mejías Valencia; edited by Tomás Cobos)