Treasury futures rose while contracts for the S&P 500 stocks benchmark declined after Fitch Ratings downgraded the US ahead of the open of Asian markets Wednesday. The dollar fell.
The yen and the Swiss franc rose in a sign of demand for havens, with the dollar broadly lower against its Group-of-10 peers. The move by Fitch comes at a particularly sensitive time for rates markets, with the Treasury preparing to ramp up issuance of longer-dated securities.
Cash trading in US government bonds will begin at 9 a.m. Tokyo time, at the same time as equity markets open in Japan, South Korea and Australia.
Sentiment going into Wednesday had already been downbeat, with stock futures for Hong Kong, Japan and Australia all lower. The S&P 500 finished Tuesday’s session with a small loss as the rally that drove the stock market up almost 30% from its October lows took a breather. Bonds fell, with the 30-year yield hitting its highest since November.
Just a few days ahead of the all-important jobs report, data suggested some softening in demand for workers in a still tight US labor market. The numbers weren’t enough to entice investors, who also grappled with a mixed bag of corporate earnings.
“It looks like stocks on Wall Street are taking a breather from the relentless rally,” said Fawad Razaqzada, market analyst at City Index and Forex.com. While many traders are afraid of standing in the way of the rally, we could see some downside action — with investors likely to “sit on their hands” in the run-up to employment data and earnings from giants Apple Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.
In late trading, Advanced Micro Devices Inc. gained after the company topped second-quarter estimates and said it was making further inroads in artificial-intelligence computing. Starbucks Corp. dropped as its quarterly sales fell short of analysts’ estimates, a sign that momentum may be slowing for the coffee giant amid higher prices and tighter pocketbooks.
Oppenheimer Asset Management’s John Stoltzfus lifted his target on the S&P 500 index, a day after Morgan Stanley’s Michael Wilson, one of the market’s leading doomsayers, sounded less bearish than usual.
Stoltzfus now sees the S&P 500 index hitting 4,900 by the end of the year, leaving room for another 7% gain. The target would mark a new record for the gauge, and one that plays out against bearish predictions by prominent Wall Street names such as Wilson, JPMorgan’s Marko Kolanovic and Bank of America Corp.’s Michael Hartnett.
Key events this week:
- China Caixin Services PMI, Thursday
- Eurozone S&P Global Eurozone Services PMI, PPI, Thursday
- Bank of England rate decision, Thursday
- US initial jobless claims, productivity, factory orders, ISM Services, Thursday
- Eurozone retail sales, Friday
- US unemployment rate, non-farm payrolls, Friday
Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
- S&P 500 futures fell 0.4% as of 7:03 a.m. Tokyo time. The S&P 500 fell 0.3%
- Nasdaq 100 futures fell 0.5%. The Nasdaq 100 fell 0.3%
- Nikkei 225 futures fell 0.6%
- Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index futures fell 0.5%
- Hang Seng Index futures fell 0.7%
Currencies
- The euro rose 0.3% to $1.1017
- The Japanese yen rose 0.3% to 142.95 per dollar
- The offshore yuan was little changed at 7.1849 per dollar
- The Australian dollar rose 0.1% to $0.6622
Cryptocurrencies
- Bitcoin was little changed at $29,185.8
- Ether fell 0.2% to $1,846.2
Bonds
- The yield on 10-year Treasuries advanced six basis points to 4.02% Tuesday
Commodities
- West Texas Intermediate crude rose 0.7% to $81.92 a barrel
- Spot gold rose 0.3% to $1,950.21 an ounce
This story was produced with the assistance of Bloomberg Automation.
--With assistance from Rita Nazareth.