Investors digested Fed's plan to cut interest rates, sell Treasurys

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Investors digested Fed's plan to cut interest rates, sell Treasurys

US stock futures were the higher on Thursday as investors digested the Federal Reserve's plans for quitting asset purchase and raising interest rates.

Dow Jones Industrial Average futures rose 177 points, or 0.53%, while S&P 500 futures and Nasdaq 100 futures rose 0.56% and 0.6%, respectively.

The gains come after all three major averages shot up about 1% after Jerome Powell indicated that the central bank could start tapering later this year and raise rates in 2022.

Talk of inflation hikes and the price cut caused investors to sell Treasurys with the yield on the 10 - year note rising 3 basis points to 1.33%.

In stocks, financials, including the Bank of America Corp. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. were in focus as the yield curve steepened following signals from the Fed.

In other parts of the world, semiconductors Advanced Micro Devices Inc. and Nvidia Corp. gained after the White House announced it was looking into ways to solve a chip shortage that is impacting automakers.

In earnings, Darden Restaurants Inc. announced quarterly profit and revenue that exceeded Wall Street forecasts as same restaurant sales surged 47.5%. Consulting firm Accenture plc raised net sales for the current quarter and posted in-line revenue due to strong demand for its cloud and security services.

Costco Wholesale Corp. and Nike Inc. are set to release quarterly results after the closing bell.

On commodity reports, West Texas Intermediate crude oil slid 52 cents to $71.71 a barrel and gold fell $3.70 to $1775.10 an ounce.

In Germany, France CAC 40 and France's DAX 30 advanced 0.77% and 0.5%, respectively. Britain s FTSE 100 ticked up 0.15% after the Bank of England announced policy on hold and downgraded its growth forecast.

Asian bourses were higher with Hong Kong's Hang Seng index and China Shanghai Composite rallying 0.38% and 1.19%, respectively. Japan's Nikkei 225 was closed for holidays.