Live stock market news updates: Mute stock futures as economic data comes out

US stock futures were volatile on Friday morning ahead of the long weekend.

Futures related to the S&P 500 (^GSPC) fell 0.1%, while futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) hovered below the flat line. Contracts in the technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) fell 0.2%.

US stock and bond markets will be closed on Monday, December 26, in observance of Christmas Day. Bond markets will close an hour earlier than usual on Friday at 2pm ET.

The core personal consumption expenditures price index — the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation — rose at an annual rate of 5.5% in November and 0.1% from the previous month, on par with consensus estimates of economists polled by Bloomberg. The figure moderated from readings of 6.1% and 0.3%, respectively, in October.

Core personal consumption expenditures, which exclude the volatile food and energy components, rose 4.7% on the year and 0.2% on the month.

Investors will also get reads on the latest University of Michigan consumer sentiment survey and new home sales.

After the Fed’s final policy decision for 2022 last week, strategists noted that the most surprising data among economic forecasts from officials was the upward revision of their core PCE forecast to 3.5% from a previous 3.1% at the end of 2023. This indicates Many analysts argue that the Fed will need to keep rates at a high final rate through 2023.

“We expect the Fed to revise its forecasts as soon as possible in March, although progress will be slow at first; policymakers seem to have been hurt by the experience of the last year and a half, and they will want to make sure that they are safe,” said Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon. On a note: “They’re not cutting their numbers prematurely.” “The markets won’t wait.”

Friday’s moves follow a previous brutal trading day that saw the S&P, Dow, and Nasdaq post losses of 1.4%, 1%, and 2.2%, respectively. Investors were spooked by a warning from chip maker Micron Technology about the semiconductor industry, a strong labor market and consumer spending data that confirmed expectations for interest rates “higher for longer”.

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Oil prices rose on Friday and headed for a big weekly gain as investors expected a drop in the supply of Russian crude. This helped assuage concerns about lower US transportation fuel demand ahead of a winter storm’s move toward North America. West Texas Intermediate crude futures — the US benchmark — rose 2% to $79 a barrel.

US Treasury yields rose, while the US dollar index fell against a basket of other currencies.

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Alexandra Semenova is a correspondent at Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @employee

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