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Stock market today: Live updates
New Jersey

Stock market today: Live updates

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange during morning trading on August 20, 2024 in New York City.

Michael M. Santiago |

Stock futures were more or less unchanged on Wednesday evening as investors await comments from Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell expected later this week.

Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average were just above the zero line. S&P 500 futures rose about 0.05 percent, while Nasdaq-100 futures rose more than 0.1 percent.

In after-hours trading, software giant Snowflake suffered a share price loss of almost 8 percent, despite beating quarterly expectations and slightly raising its full-year sales forecast. Urban Outfitters lost more than 8.5 percent after the retailer’s second-quarter sales disappointed analysts.

Wednesday’s trading marked a continuation of the recent recovery rally after newly released minutes from the Fed’s July meeting indicated that “the vast majority” of participants in the central bank meeting thought it would “probably” be appropriate to cut interest rates at the September meeting – if data continues to come in as expected.

Investors appeared to cheer the results, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite posting their ninth day of gains in the past 10 days. The S&P 500’s gain was less than 1% below its record close. The 30-stock Dow posted its sixth positive day in the past seven days.

Traders are now turning their attention to Powell’s expected speech at the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium on Friday, hoping for further insights on interest rate policy. According to the CME Group’s FedWatch tool, traders are currently pricing in a 100 percent chance of a rate cut next month, but are divided on how big the cut will be.

“Last month’s volatility has subsided as macroeconomic fears have eased, expectations have been reset and investors have used the weakness as an opportunity to increase their risk exposure. The next catalyst for markets is the Fed data… this is likely to lead to a wait-and-see approach through Friday,” said Mark Hackett, head of investment research at Nationwide.

The weekly data on unemployment claims will be published on Thursday. Intuitive And Ross Stores will also announce their results.

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