Stocks turned weaker before the market open on Friday, as the U.S. added fewer jobs than expected in August.
Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 5 points, or less than 0.1%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite futures were up 0.1%. Futures had been higher, and the Dow was in the green before the jobs release.
The U.S. added 235,000 jobs in August, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, missing estimates of 720,000. The unemployment rate fell to 5.2%.
The number of people that could not work full hours because their employer was not fully opened due to the pandemic rose in August. Investors had wanted to see that the Covid-19 Delta variant was not restraining domestic economic growth.
One positive is that this could mean the Federal Reserve will be compelled to hold off on reducing economic support for the immediate term. The Fed is expected to announce soon that it will lower its monthly bond purchases, but the poor jobs number could delay those plans.
“Today the Employment Situation report is the key event,” wrote Tom Essaye, founder of Sevens Report Research before the report hit the wires.
Here are five stocks making moves in Friday’s premarket action:
PagerDuty (ticker: PD) stock rose 15.3% after reporting a loss of 13 cents a share, better than the estimated 15 cents a share, on sales of $67.5 million, above expectations of $65.6 million.
DocuSign (DOCU) stock rose 2% after reporting a profit of 47 cents, beating estimates of 40 cents a share, on sales of $511 million, above expectations for $487 million.
Yext (YEXT) stock fell 12.9% after reporting a loss of 6 cents a share, better than the expected loss of 7 cents a share, on sales of $98 million, above expectations for $95 million.
Broadcom (AVGO) stock rose 0.8% after reporting a profit of $6.96 a share, beating estimates of $6.88 a share, on sales of $6.78 billion, above expectations for $6.76 billion.
MongoDB (MDB) stock gained 13.4% after Stifel raised its price target to $495 from $384.
Write to Jacob Sonenshine at [email protected]
