Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, the United States, March 29, 2023.
Brendan McDermid | Portal
US stock futures remained flat Thursday night.
Dow Jones Industrial Average futures were up 14 points, or 0.04%. S&P 500 futures were up 0.09%, while Nasdaq 100 futures were up 0.05%.
The Dow is up more than 141 points, or 0.43%, during Thursday’s regular trading. The S&P 500 was up 0.57% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq was up 0.73%.
The three major moving averages are also on course for a positive week. The Dow is up 1.93% and the S&P 500 is up 2%. Both indices are on track for their best weekly performance since January. The Nasdaq is up 1.6% this week.
Thursday’s gains come after weekly jobless claims hit 198,000, up 7,000 from the previous week. The slowdown in the labor market fueled Wall Street’s optimism that the Fed will soon end its cycle of tightening. Semiconductors had a strong day, with AMD and Nvidia up more than 1%.
The recent rally “helps to confirm the market’s perception that the issues that have propelled the market into a crisis of confidence may very well be contained,” said Quincy Krosby, LPL Financial’s chief global strategist.
“The semiconductors, [which] now recognized as a key enabler for global growth, have put in a strong performance,” continued Krosby.
However, she noted that markets are not yet fully recovered from an economic downturn.
“Economic worries shrouding recession fears have not gone away as the yield curve still offsets the market’s rise,” Krosby added.
The Federal Reserve’s favorite indicator of inflation, the Personal Consumption Spending Index, is scheduled to be released Friday at 8:30 a.m. ET. Economists polled by Dow Jones expect core PCE, which excludes energy and food costs, to gain 0.4% mom in February and is up 4.7% on a yearly basis.
Personal income data and consumer spending will also be released on Friday morning. The final March reading of the University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index is due at 10 a.m. ET.
Several central bank officials are also scheduled to speak on Friday, including Fed Governors Lisa Cook and Christopher Waller.