US futures climb ahead of the Federal Reserve's rate decision; the euro is soaring as the ECB calls a surprise meeting
- US futures edged up while investors braced for the Fed's rate decision due Wednesday.
- Meanwhile, the euro shot up against the dollar after the ECB called an adhoc meeting.
US stock futures rose Wednesday as investors anticipate the Federal Reserve's rate decision, while the euro strengthened after the European Central Bank announced it would hold an ad hoc meeting to discuss market conditions.
Futures on the S&P 500, Nasdaq, and Dow Jones climbed 0.4%, 0.5, and 0.2% respectively in the early hours of trading.
Investors are unanimously expecting the Fed to hike interest rates after last week's inflation data showed consumer prices accelerated in May at their fastest pace since December 1981 on the back of surging food and fuel prices. The US consumer price index rose 8.6%, exceeding economists' forecasts.
''Financial markets have been beset with shivers of anticipation of more aggressive interest rate moves, and as the clock ticks down to the key Federal Reserve meeting later, nerves are set to stay frayed," said Susannah Streeter a senior markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.
Expectations that the Fed will lift the benchmark rate by 75 basis points are on the cards, which would be the largest single rate increase since November 1994.
Meanwhile, US Treasuries steadied, with the yield on the 10-year US Treasury note slightly slipping to 3.432%, just shy of its 11-year high while the 2-year US Treasury note, which is the most sensitive to interest rates retreated 7 basis points to 3.377%.
In Europe, the euro was up 0.8% against the dollar — set for its biggest jump since the start of June — might intervene in the government bond market to close the gap between the borrowing costs of wealthier nations. such as German and France, and the so-called periphery, which includes the likes of Italy, Greece, Spain and Portugal, among others.
The meeting "could suggest that the ECB is not happy with the widening of peripheral EU yield spreads that has unfolded in aggressive fashion in the wake of the ECB meeting last week," analysts at Saxo Bank said. The bank said it would raise interest rates by 25 basis points in July in an aggressive move to tackle hot inflation in the eurozone.
European bond yields took a dive in the wake of the "ad hoc" meeting announcement, with the yield on Italy's 10-year government bond plunging 25 basis points to 3.935%. The yield on Germany's 10-year bond, widely considered to be the regional benchmark, tumbled 4 basis points to 1.750% and Spain's 10-year government bond slipped 5 basis points to 3.025%.
Elsewhere in Asia, stocks largely looked positive, with Hong Kong's Hang Seng rising 1.09% and Shanghai Composite Index increasing 0.5%, while the Nikkei 225 dipped 1.14% The overall gains in China shares follow better-than-expected Chinese economic data, with retail sales falling 6.7% as opposed to the expected 7.1%, per a Reuters poll.