S&P 500, Nasdaq, Dow Futures Inch Higher As Investors Cheer Cooling Yields — GOOGL, MU, MAT, NVDA In Focus

• The S&P 500 ended Thursday 0.2% higher, the Nasdaq 100 rose 0.3%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.04%.
• Fed Bank of Minneapolis President Neel Kashkari told Bloomberg Television he doesn’t know how high rates will have to go to cool prices.
• Micron posted blockbuster after-hours earnings on Wednesday, with revenue quadrupling last quarter. 

S&P 500, Dow and Nasdaq futures rose after the market closed higher on Thursday, mainly on easing Treasury yields.  

The S&P 500 ended Thursday 0.2% higher, the Nasdaq 100 rose 0.3%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.04%. The Russell 2000, which tracks small-cap stocks, gained 0.4%.

Following market close, S&P 500 futures were up 0.03%, while futures tied to Dow Jones Industrial Average were up 10 points, or 0.02%. Nasdaq-100 futures advanced 0.07% at the time of writing.

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) rose 0.3%, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF (DIA) was flat, and the Nasdaq-100 tracking Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ) added 0.5%. 

Meanwhile, the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) and the iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) rose about 1.5%, tracking gains in Nvidia (NVDA) and Micron Tech (MU). The broader Vanguard Information Technology ETF (VGT) added about 1.2%.

Retail sentiment on Stocktwits for QQQ, SPY, and DIA was ‘bullish’ with ‘high’ message volumes.

US Market Drivers

Treasury yields reversed course during late-morning action, with 10-year and 30-year yields sliding 5 and 3 basis points, respectively. Short-term rates fell more sharply, as the 2-year Treasury yield dropped 10 basis points.

Crude prices pushed higher following reports from The Wall Street Journal that Washington is deploying a third aircraft carrier strike group to the Middle East. Brent crude futures surged over 4% to finish at $102.31 per barrel, while domestic West Texas Intermediate futures rose 2.7% to settle at $92.87 a barrel.

Market focus shifts to Friday’s September employment data, where Dow Jones consensus projections anticipate 84,000 payroll additions and an unchanged unemployment rate of 4.1%.

The upcoming release arrives as investors weigh the Federal Reserve’s path, with traders pricing in a 72% probability that policymakers hold borrowing costs steady in October.

“We continue to think the Fed remains oriented towards a limited two or three hike mini-cycle in the base case,” Krishna Guha at Evercore told Bloomberg. “It does not currently see demand so strong as to create obvious danger of demand-driven overheating risk.” 

Key Trending Stocks

Tech giant Google could face jury trials that could cost the company more than $3.2 billion in damages over its alleged monopolization of the digital advertising market, a federal judge in New York ruled late on Wednesday. 

Mattel Inc. (MAT): The Barbie maker reportedly attracted takeover interest from brand-licensing giant Authentic Brands Group.  

Renowned investor Michael Burry has issued a stark warning to technology investors, alleging that the aggressive capital deployment into artificial intelligence infrastructure mirrors the unsustainable computer-leasing mania of the late 1960s. 

Anthropic PBC could reportedly be preparing for a mid-November stock market debut, with the artificial intelligence company behind Claude potentially starting formal marketing for its initial public offering as early as the week of Nov. 9. 

Micron Technology (MU) CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said on Thursday morning that demand for memory is outpacing the company’s ability to supply it, with tight market conditions expected to persist through 2028. 

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