Wall Street recovers slightly ahead of Federal Reserve's rate decision

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The previous Friday had seen a slump in chipmakers due to concerns of weak demand and bruised mega-cap growth stocks as a result of rising Treasury yields. This led to the S&P 500, Nasdaq, and Dow tumbling between 0.8% and 1.5%, marking their worst single-day fall since August 24.

Traders are almost unanimously expecting the Fed to keep rates unchanged at the range of 5.25% to 5.5% at its meeting on Wednesday. The odds for another pause in November stand at 69%, according to the CME FedWatch Tool.

This expectation comes despite recent hotter-than-expected economic data which has eased recession fears without raising concerns of a September rate hike. However, rising energy prices have emerged as a potential inflation threat, which still remains above the Fed’s target of 2%. “Further rate hikes would risk sending the economy into a hard landing scenario,” said Thomas Simons, U.S. economist at Jefferies.

Leading investors like Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Asset Management and Janus Henderson Investors anticipate that the central bank will lift its economic growth projections this week but expect rates to have peaked.

In other market news, Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU) rebounded 2.4% in premarket trading following Friday’s rout, after Deutsche Bank upgraded its rating on the stock to “buy” from “hold”. Additionally, Blackstone (NYSE:BX) Inc and a vacation lodging platform are set to join the S&P 500 ahead of the start of trading. Their stocks were down by 0.5% and 0.1%, respectively.

The Bank of England and Bank of Japan are also due to give their monetary policy decisions this week, adding to the global anticipation of central banks’ next moves.

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