(Reuters) -U.S. stocks were poised to open higher on Monday after steep losses in the previous session as easing Middle East tensions buoyed risk appetite, while investors looked ahead to an action-packed week with major tech earnings and a key inflation print.
The Nasdaq and the S&P 500 ended lower on Friday as Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) shares weighed after a dour quarterly earnings report, with both the indexes suffering six straight sessions of declines last week, their longest since October 2022.
Some megacap growth stocks edged higher in premarket trading, with Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META), Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) up between 0.5% and 1.0%.
Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) inched up 0.7%, rebounding from a 10% drop in the last session.
“The market got over-sold on Friday because of Netflix earnings, it was primarily a tech-driven decline,” said Jay Hatfield, CEO and portfolio manager at InfraCap.
“We’re headed into megacap earnings and so people are starting to realize that Netflix is not very indicative of what’s going to happen with other megacap stocks.”
Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), Meta Platforms, Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) will be in focus this week as the companies gear up to deliver their quarterly numbers, whose performance could further test the rally in U.S. stocks.
The risk-on mode was also supported by signs of easing tensions in the Middle East, as Iran’s foreign minister said on Friday Tehran was investigating an overnight attack, adding that so far a link to Israel had not been proven as he downplayed the strike.
Equities have sold-off recently as market participants readjust their interest rate cut expectations from the U.S. Federal Reserve after a string of strong economic data signaling persistent inflationary pressures.
Money markets are now pricing in just about 38 basis points (bps) of rate cuts this year, down from about 150 bps seen at the beginning of the year, according to LSEG data.
On the docket this week would be the price consumption expenditure (PCE) index reading for March — the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge – to further ascertain the monetary policy trajectory.
Fed policymakers were in a media blackout ahead of their latest policy meeting on May 1.
At 8:26 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 192 points, or 0.5%, S&P 500 e-minis were up 21.75 points, or 0.43%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 75.5 points, or 0.44%.
Among single stocks, Tesla fell 4.1% before the bell as the electric vehicle maker cut prices in a number of its major markets, including China and Germany, following price reductions in the United States.
Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) rose 3.3% after the business software maker backed away from its talks to acquire data-management software firm Informatica after the two companies could not agree on terms. Informatica’s shares were down 5.1%.
Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) added 1.8% after the telecom firm said it lost fewer-than-expected wireless subscribers in the first quarter.
Source: Economy - investing.com
