Stocks are whipsawing as traders await a key US jobs report and Fed Chair Powell's speech
- Stocks were whipsawing on Friday ahead of the release of US employment figures and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's final speech before the central bank's next policy meeting.
- Nonfarm payrolls are expected to show the US economy added 160,000 jobs in August, in line with the number added in July.
- Powell is scheduled to speak about the US economic outlook and interest-rate policy at the University of Zurich.
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Stocks were whipsawing on Friday ahead of the release of US employment figures and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's final speech before the central bank's next policy meeting.
Here's the market roundup as of 9:45 a.m. (4:45 a.m. EST):
- European equities were broadly higher with Germany's DAX up 0.1%, while the Euro Stoxx 50 and Britain's FTSE 100 were flat.
- Asian indexes rose with China's Shanghai Composite and Japan's Nikkei up 0.5%, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up 0.7%.
- US stocks are poised for a positive open. Futures underlying the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500, and Nasdaq were up between 0.2% and 0.3%.
- Oil prices have dipped with West Texas Intermediate crude down 0.1% at $56.20 a barrel, and Brent crude flat at about $61.
- Gold slid by 0.6% to $1,517.
Nonfarm payrolls are expected to show the US economy added 160,000 jobs in August, in line with the number added in July. A beat could be on the cards: the number of private-sector jobs rose by 195,000 last month, besting the 148,000 expected by analysts, according to the ADP Research Institute. Economic activity in America's non-manufacturing sector also accelerated last month, the latest Institute for Supply Management data showed.
That data "bodes well for another solid reading that will again betray the fact the US economy is further from recession than real and anticipated Fed policy moves would suggest," Neil Wilson, chief market analyst for Markets.com, said in a morning note.
Powell is scheduled to speak about the US economic outlook and interest-rate policy at the University of Zurich at 6:30 p.m. local time, or 12:30 p.m. in New York. Traders will be looking for any signals from the Fed about its future plans for interest rates.
"Investors would like to know how much attention the Fed is paying to the economic data and Donald Trump," Naeem Aslam, chief market analyst at TF Global Markets UK, said in a morning note. They will be keen to "spot the next move by the chairman," he added.
News that trade talks between the US and China will resume in October also buoyed market sentiment. However, analysts were skeptical that a resolution is around the corner.
"We have seen this meme over and over and over - and yet tariffs keep marching higher and higher and higher," Michael Every, senior Asia-Pacific strategist at Rabobank, said in a research note.