U.S. stock futures slipped on Thursday night after the major averages suffered declines amid concerns of stubbornly high inflation metrics.
Dow Jones Industrial Average futures fell by 50 points, or 0.1%. S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures dipped by 0.3% and 0.4%, respectively.
During regular trading, the Dow shed 431.20 points, or 1.26%. The S&P 500 slid 1.38%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite dipped 1.78%.
These losses came after January’s producer price index, an inflation metric that tracks wholesale prices, rose 0.7% according to Thursday’s report. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had anticipated a 0.4% increase. The Labor Department also reported an unexpected fall in initial jobless claims for the week ending Feb. 11.
The selloff intensified late in the day following comments from St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard said he backed a 50 basis point interest rate hike at the central bank’s previous meeting and that he would not rule out a rate increase of that magnitude at the March meeting.
Fed commentary aside, consumers have been a key focal point for investors this week, particularly in light of the latest round of inflation and retail sales data.
“I think the equity market is listening to data about the consumer that’s concurrent — that there’s retail spending that bounced back, that consumer confidence bounced back, and that services PMI bounced out of contraction. There are things to be happy about — the labor market is still tight,” SoFi’s head of investment strategy Liz Young said on CNBC’s “Closing Bell: Overtime.”
“But what I think the equity market is not pricing in at this point, or is not worried enough about, is that the consumer spending at some point. Savings run dry, and wage growth is falling, and it can’t support that level of spending going forward. Debt is piling up,” added Young.
The major indexes are mixed ahead of the final trading session of the week. The Dow is down 0.51% for the week. The 30-stock index is…
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