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U.S. equity futures were mixed in early Thursday trading, while the dollar powered higher against its global peers, as investors tweaked their near-term interest-rate forecasts while eyeing tomorrow’s key inflation-data release.
Stocks ended higher Wednesday, with the S&P 500 notching another all-time high at the close of trading and extending its first-quarter gain past 10%. Markets digested another massive Treasury bond auction and booked gains for megacap tech stocks.
The S&P 500 has a shot at being up 10% or more in back-to-back quarters for the first time since Q4 '11 and Q1 '12.
That was also an election year. 🤔
— Ryan Detrick, CMT (@RyanDetrick) March 27, 2024
After-hours comments from Federal Reserve Gov. Christopher Waller, however, could weigh on markets into the Thursday session. He told an event at the New York Economic Club that “there is no rush to cut the policy rate” given elevated levels of inflation.
“It is appropriate to reduce the overall number of rate cuts or push them further into the future in response to the recent data,” Waller added, citing the first two months of growth and inflation figures.
Waller’s remarks lifted the U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its global peers, around 0.32% in overnight trading to 104.639.
Traders also pared bets on a June interest-rate cut to around 60%, according to CME Group’s FedWatch tool. Benchmark 2-year Treasury note yields rose to 4.625%.
Investors will track three high-profile data releases today, including a final reading of fourth-quarter GDP growth, last estimated at 3.2%, as well as weekly jobless claims, at 8:30 a.m. U.S. Eastern.
The University of Michigan’s benchmark consumer sentiment survey will be released at 10 a.m. Eastern.
Heading into the start of the trading day on Wall Street, the last full session of the first quarter, futures contracts tied to the S&P 500 suggest a 3-point opening-bell gain.
Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which is up 5.5% for the year, are looking at a 30-point bump while the Nasdaq, which is up 9.25% for the year, is called 10 points lower.Â
Home Depot (HD)  shares were lower, slipping 0.45%, after the home-improvement retailing giant unveiled plans to buy SRS Distribution, a materials supplier focused on professional contractors, for around $18.25 billion.
Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) , which was recently replaced in the Dow by Amazon (AMZN) , jumped 2.25% after posting stronger-than-expected fiscal-second-quarter sales and adjusted earnings.
In overseas markets, Europe’s Stoxx 600 was marked 0.25% higher in holiday-thinned trading, which allowed the regional benchmark to reach an all-time high and extend its 2024 gain to around 7.22%.
Britain’s FTSE 100, meanwhile, rose 0.28% in London to take its meager quarter-to-date gain to just over 3%.
Overnight in Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 ended the final session of the quarter — and indeed the country’s fiscal year — with a 1.46% decline. But at 40,168.07 points, the benchmark is still up an impressive 44% over the past 12 months.Â
The regionwide MSCI ex-Japan index, meanwhile, ended 0.26% higher thanks in part to modest gains for stocks in China as the benchmark CSI 300 ended the quarter with a 2.62% gain.
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