Traders work on the New York Stock Exchange floor on Sept. 9, 2024.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images
U.S. stock futures were little changed on Thursday evening as traders sought to shake off a sluggish September.
S&P 500 futures inched lower by 0.07%. Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average hovered near the flatline, and Nasdaq 100 futures slipped 0.13%.
During Thursday’s regular trading, investors snapped up shares of big tech names, including Nvidia, lifting the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite for a fourth consecutive day. The broad market index is now down 0.9% in September. The 30-stock Dow advanced about 0.6% on Thursday, bolstered by Salesforce and Microsoft.
Wall Street is now looking ahead toward the Federal Reserve’s policy meeting on Sept. 17-18, where the central bank is largely anticipated to lower interest rates by 25 basis points. Currently, the Fed’s target rate is sitting at 5.25% to 5.5%.
“We’re in a period where the Fed is going to begin cutting and we think that this is going to be a period where you want to position for higher volatility,” said Jill Carey Hall, head of U.S. small- and mid-cap strategy at Bank of America Securities.
Indeed, rate-sensitive sectors of the market have held up this week, even as investors have bought beat-up shares of tech companies. Real estate is toting a 2.8% week-to-date advance through Thursday’s close, while utilities are up roughly 2%.
“At the end of the day, the U.S. consumer and the economy continue to do well, [and] profits continue to print above expectations,” Dan Greenhaus, Solus Alternative Asset Management chief strategist, said on CNBC’s “Closing Bell” on Thursday.
“And so while we had a meaningful sell-off driven by some of those AI names, for sure, the rebound seems entirely justified, because it doesn’t seem like these issues are broadening out,” he added.
The three major averages are also on track to post weekly gains, with the S&P 500 up 3.5% and the Nasdaq on track for a 5.3% jump. The Dow is up 1.9% week to date.
On the economic front, traders will look toward August’s import prices data on Friday morning. Preliminary consumer sentiment figures for September are also scheduled for release.