US stocks poised for firm gains ahead of trio of Fed speakers
New York (Oct 15) Wall Street was set for a rebound on Thursday, with stock futures keying off gains in Asia and moving sharply higher ahead of a raft of economic data and a trio of Federal Reserve speakers.
Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average YMZ5, +0.45% climbed 110 points, or 0.7%, to 16,932, while those for the S&P 500 index ESZ5, +0.59% gained 15 points, or 0.8%, to 1,999. Futures for the Nasdaq 100 index NQZ5, +0.74% jumped 37.25 points, or 0.9%, to 4,363.75.
The indicated gains come after a downbeat day on Wednesday, when the Fed’s so-called Beige Book and U.S. producer prices offered a muted picture of growth in the U.S.
Angus Nicholson, market analyst at IG, said Thursday’s futures gains were a combination of a bad-news-is-good-news rally and inspiration from Asia’s solid stock-market performance earlier in the day.
“Health care was the best performing sector in [Japan’s] Nikkei NIK, +1.15% and energy and materials performed particularly strongly in [Australia’s] ASX XJO, +0.63% If those strong sectoral performances were re-enacted in the U.S. markets, it should see a decent performance,” he said in emailed comments.
Shares of mining company Freeport-McMoRan Inc. FCX, +2.59% climbed 1.1% ahead of the bell, while oil driller Transocean Ltd. RIG, +3.08% rose 0.3%.
Data: Three readings are released at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time on Thursday:
Weekly jobless claims are forecast to have risen to 270,000 from 263,000 last week, according to economists polled by MarketWatch.
Inflation for September is expected to have slipped to negative 0.2%, down from negative 0.1% in August.
The Empire State manufacturing index for October is forecast to improve to negative 8.3 from negative 14.7 last month.
At 10 a.m. Eastern, the Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index for October is due, projected to climb to negative 1 from negative 6 in September.
Fed speakers: St. Louis Fed President James Bullard gives the opening remarks at a conference in St. Louis at 8 a.m. Eastern. Bullard is not a voting member of the central bank’s policy setting committee this year.
New York Fed President William Dudley, who is a voting member, will give a speech in Washington at 10:30 a.m. Eastern.
Source: MarkerWatch
