Nasdaq, S&P, Dow futures tick up ahead of more labor market data, Powell redux

Inventory index futures have been barely greater Thursday, and the market might be set for a wait-and-see session with the roles report on the horizon.

Nasdaq 100 futures (NDX:IND) +0.4%, S&P futures (SPX) +0.2% and Dow futures (INDU) +0.1% have been greater.

Progress is on the entrance foot once more and Nvidia (NVDA) may be very near including $1T in market cap in this 12 months alone.

Fed Chairman Jay Powell returns to Capitol Hill this morning, showing earlier than the Senate Banking Committee. On Wednesday, merchants appeared relieved he did not come out extra hawkish.

“Yesterday’s remarks have been in step with three or 4 price cuts this 12 months, however there was shock suggestion {that a} proposed tightening of financial institution regulation could also be rethought,” UBS’ Paul Donovan mentioned.

Charges have been little modified. The ten-year Treasury yield (US10Y) was flat at 4.10%.The two-year yield (US2Y) fell 1 foundation level to 4.56%.

ING mentioned yesterday’s Treasury market noticed extra volatility from the New York Group Bancorp (NYCB) capital increase than Powell.

“Whereas wider threat sentiment nonetheless seems to be strong, the response in Treasuries highlights heightened sensitivities to any indicators of stress – or downward knowledge surprises as seen in current days,” ING added.

This morning brings some extra numbers on the labor market forward of the February payrolls report on Friday.

“If (payrolls are) weak, I’ll be extra inclined to see the robust knowledge for January as a curveball,” SocGen’s Equipment Juckes mentioned. “In the event that they’re robust, I’ll count on forecasters to rethink the Fed path, once more. They’ll most likely be boring!”

Wednesday noticed the JOLTS quits price fall to 2.1%, the bottom stage since August 2020.

“If sustained, the newest dip within the quits price factors to year-on-year development within the ECI dropping to barely 3% by the center of this 12 months – beneath its tempo in 2019 – from 4.3% within the closing quarter of final 12 months,” Pantheon Macro’s Ian Shepherdson mentioned.

The Challenger February layoffs report arrives first, adopted the weekly preliminary claims figures. Economists count on that claims edged as much as 217K.

A “raft of different indicators, official and unofficial, level to rising layoffs, and we count on a marked uptrend in claims within the spring,” Shepherdson mentioned.