Opening Comment — Tuesday, October 29, 2024
DJIA: 42,387.57, up 273.17
S&P 500: 5,823.52, up 15.40
NASDAQ: 18,567.19, up 48.58
Stocks mostly lower ahead of JOLTS
Stock futures are mostly lower Tuesday morning ahead of major earnings releases, the September Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS), and measures of August home prices. As of 7:17 AM ET, the Dow is decreasing 0.3%, while the S&P 500 is down 0.1%. The Nasdaq 100 is little changed relative to fair value on the GLOBEX.
U.S. equities were higher on Monday as investors looked forward to this week’s key economic data releases, including third-quarter gross domestic product, September’s personal consumption expenditures data, and the October jobs report. The Dow was up 0.7%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite rose 0.3%. The S&P 500 increased 0.3% with nine of 11 sectors finishing in positive territory. The Financials sector was the top performer, rising 1.1%, while the Energy sector was the bottom performer, falling 0.7%.
On the data front today, preliminary September wholesale inventories are expected to have increased 0.1% month-over-month (MOM), similar to the prior month’s increase. The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller 20-City Composite Home Price Index is projected to increase 5.10% year-over-year (YOY) and 0.20% MOM for August versus the prior month’s increases of 5.92% and 0.27%, respectively. August’s Federal Housing Finance Agency House Price Index is expected to increase 0.1% MOM, similar to the prior month’s increase. The JOLTS is expected to show that there were 8.00 million job openings in September, slightly lower than the prior month’s 8.04 million. The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index is expected to register 99.5 in October, up from the prior month’s 98.7.
Across the pond, European stocks are mostly higher in mid-day trading as German consumer confidence rose more than projections and the U.K.’s mortgage approvals unexpectedly increased.
Overnight in Asia, stocks were mostly higher following Japan’s jobless rate unexpectedly decreasing to 2.4%.
In FOREX trading, the dollar is little changed as investors await key U.S. economic data and the Bank of Japan’s Thursday meeting, which may be affected by this past weekend’s election results.
Over in the commodity pits, West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil is 1.1% higher at $68.13/barrel following the U.S. announcing plans to purchase three million barrels of oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
In the metals complex, gold is 0.1% higher at $2742.90/ounce.