Wall Street is set to open lower on Thursday, with investors unable to find any new catalysts to drive further gains in indices that have returned to near all-time highs.

Half an hour before the opening, futures contracts on New York's main indices were down between 0.2% and 0.6%, heralding a session start in the red.

U.S. equity markets had already finished with insignificant scores yesterday, unable to amplify their gains despite the further decline in bond yields.

The agenda was devoid of macroeconomic figures, which certainly helped to freeze scores, and the wave of quarterly earnings is drying up, with the latest results no longer providing any real impetus.

This morning, market participants seem to be struggling to find a clear direction after the contrasting quarterly accounts of several big names in technology.

Uber Technologies is expected to fall sharply after reporting a net loss (group share) of $654 million for the first three months of the year.

Social media company Reddit is expected to start the session with a gain of over 12%, after delivering a convincing performance in its first earnings release since going public.

While the S&P 500, the benchmark index for fund managers, is up over 8% since the start of the year, some analysts are beginning to feel that valuations are stretched in the absence of a precise timetable for the Fed's next rate cuts.

In this respect, none of the indicators scheduled between now and the end of the week seems really capable of giving a clear picture of the state of the economy, and therefore of providing information on the central bank's intentions.

The only two statistics scheduled for the day are wholesale inventories and oil stocks.

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