U.S. futures are trading higher in pre-market this Friday, after the Dow Jones extended its streak of gains to seven sessions yesterday.
As of 7:05 AM, Dow Jones futures (DOWI:DJI) were up 100 points, or +0.25%. S&P 500 futures advanced 0.32%, and Nasdaq-100 futures gained 0.41%. The yield on 10-year Treasury notes was at 4.465%.
In the commodities market, West Texas Intermediate crude for June rose 0.78% to $79.88 per barrel. Brent crude for July increased 0.67%, reaching around $84.44 per barrel. Iron ore traded on the Dalian Exchange rose 0.34% to $120.90 per metric ton.
On this Friday’s economic calendar, the University of Michigan and Thomson Reuters will present the preliminary reading of the Michigan/Reuters consumer sentiment index for May at 10 AM. Later, at 2 PM, the U.S. Treasury Department will release the country’s budget for April.
European markets are up, driven by the economic recovery of the United Kingdom, which has emerged from a recession, as indicated by the latest Gross Domestic Product (GDP) data. The figures released this Friday show that the UK GDP grew 0.6% in the first quarter, surpassing the analysts’ expectations who had projected an expansion of 0.4%. This news marks a positive turn after the UK faced a mild recession in the second half of 2023.
Stock markets in Asia and the Pacific have risen, influenced by contagious optimism from Wall Street, where investors are feeding expectations of possible interest rate cuts in the United States. Notably, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index stood out with a jump of 2.30%, reaching 18,963.68 points — its highest level since August of the previous year. This increase was further motivated by news reported by Bloomberg, suggesting that China could exempt individual investors from taxes on dividends from stocks acquired through the ‘Stock Connect’ program with Hong Kong. Other indices in the region also recorded gains, such as the Shanghai SE in China, with a modest increase of 0.01%, the Nikkei in Japan, growing 0.41%, the Kospi in South Korea, advancing 0.57%, and the ASX 200 in Australia, rising 0.35%.
On Thursday, the Dow Jones extended its run of gains to seven days. The indices Dow Jones, S&P 500, and Nasdaq rose 0.9%, 0.5%, and 0.3%, respectively. Investors responded positively to a report from the Department of Labor that showed an unexpected increase in unemployment insurance claims, suggesting a possible interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve. For the week ending May 4, claims rose to 231,000, an increase of 22,000 from the previous week, exceeding economists’ expectations who had projected an increase to only 210,000. This level is the highest since the 234,000 claims registered in the week ending August 26.
Scheduled to present quarterly reports this morning are Enbridge (NYSE:ENB), Inspired Entertainment (NASDAQ:INSE), DigitalOcean Holdings (NYSE:DOCN), CRH plc (NYSE:CRH), Soho House (NYSE:SHCO), Sphere (NYSE:SPHR), Hawaiian Electric Industries (NYSE:HE), AMC Networks (NASDAQ:AMCX), among others.