U.S. stock futures pointed higher Thursday morning as traders looked to recover from a sharp sell-off the previous session, with the signing of a U.S.-Iran interim agreement pushing oil prices lower and offering some relief at the gas pump.
Investors looked past the Fed's hawkish signals on interest rates as oil prices fell to pre-war levels
Spencer Platt / Getty Images
U.S. stock futures pointed higher Thursday morning as traders looked to recover from a sharp sell-off the previous session, with the signing of a U.S.-Iran interim agreement pushing oil prices lower and offering some relief at the gas pump.
Among the major futures contracts, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was pointing to a gain of 303 points, or 0.6%, while S&P 500 futures added 0.9% and those tracking the Nasdaq $NDAQ 100 were up 1.6%.
AAA data showed the national average for a gallon of gasoline slipping under $4 for the first time since April, a development tied to crude prices pulling back toward where they stood before the war. Brent crude fell 1.4% to $78.44 a barrel.
Wednesday's sell-off came after the Federal Reserve held rates steady but signaled a more aggressive posture on future increases. The Fed's revised "dot plot" placed the median projected year-end rate at 3.8%, a step up from 3.4% in the March outlook and a signal that borrowing costs could rise at least once before year's end. New Fed Chair Kevin Warsh declined to enter a forecast of his own, leaving an additional layer of ambiguity over where policy is headed.
CME $CME Group futures pricing put the odds of a September rate increase at 64%, a sharp jump from the roughly 29% probability that prevailed heading into Wednesday's Fed decision.
Semiconductor shares posted some of the sharpest premarket moves, led by Intel $INTC, which surged 9% after President Donald Trump announced a domestic chip-design partnership between the company and Apple $AAPL. Micron $MU climbed 4.7% and Nvidia $NVDA was up 1.2%.
Record highs were logged in Asia, where Tokyo's Nikkei 225 advanced 1.7% and Seoul's Kospi rose 2.3%. On the monetary policy front, the Bank of England opted to keep its benchmark rate unchanged as well, with major central banks broadly wary of the war's continued inflationary pressure.
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