The great sell-off may be taking pause.

About two hours before the New York opening, Dow futures are up about 150 points and S.P. futures show similar gains.

In Asia today, afternoon trading raised prices and China’s market even ended up for the day. Japan, off 4.7 percent at its lunch break, ended the day having recovered two-thirds of the fall.

European indexes are lower for the day, but turned up around 4:30 a.m. New York time. The FTSE 100 in London fell below 4,800 points before it began to recover, but is now over 5,000.

What remains to be seen is whether there will actually be buyers for shares when trading opens in New York. Phil Roth, a longtime market watcher with Miller Tabak, says there is little evidence that either individual investors or traditional money managers are putting in money, so buying by hedge funds may be needed.

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