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(Reuters) -The S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures slipped on Wednesday as investors awaited a slew of data to gauge the Federal Reserve’s interest rate path and the state of the U.S. economy.
The personal consumption expenditures price index, the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation, and non-farm payroll numbers are set for release on Thursday and Friday, respectively.
The ADP National Employment report is due at 8:15 a.m. ET and is expected to show that private payrolls increased by 195,000 jobs in August after rising by 324,000 in July.
The second estimate for the second-quarter gross domestic product (GDP) is due 15 minutes later.
“Data is king right now in terms of market sentiment,” said Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Hargreaves Lansdown in a note.
“A raft of other figures will be picked through today to see if the information backs up expectations that central bank policymakers will leave rates unchanged.”
Wall Street ended sharply higher on Tuesday after a drop in monthly job openings raised hopes the U.S. Federal Reserve could pause interest rate hikes, sending megacap growth stocks higher.
Traders’ bets on the Fed leaving interest rates unchanged in September stand at 87%, while odds are nearly equally split between a pause and a rate hike in November, according to CME Group’s (NASDAQ:CME) FedWatch tool.
The 10-year Treasury yield, which had tumbled to a near three-week low in the previous session, rose to 4.15%, dragging major growth stocks, with Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) leading declines before the bell, down 0.6%.
U.S.-listed shares of Chinese companies including PDD Holdings, JD (NASDAQ:JD).com, Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU) and Alibaba (NYSE:BABA) fell between 0.5% and 2% on concerns over the country’s property market and trade relations between Washington and Beijing.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo talked up American firms’ desire to do business in China after having labeled it “uninvestible”.
At 7:07 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 5 points, or 0.01%, S&P 500 e-minis were down 4 points, or 0.09%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were down 27.75 points, or 0.18%.
Shares of HP Inc (NYSE:HPQ) slid 8.2% in premarket trading as the personal computer maker trimmed its annual forecast due to slowing demand.
Rite Aid (NYSE:RAD) dropped 3.7% after S&P Global Ratings downgraded the drug retailer due to increased risk from restructuring.
Texas Instruments (NASDAQ:TXN) fell 2.1% after Bernstein downgraded the analog chipmaker to “underperform” from “market perform”.
