Stock market news live updates: Stock futures drift lower as investors await jobless claims

August 20, 2020

3 minutes read

Stock futures fell Thursday morning as investors awaited the Labor Department’s weekly jobless claims report and another handful of earnings results before the bell.

Federal Open Market Committee’s July meeting minutes, as well as officials’ apparent unreadiness to clearly signal their guidance on the path forward for interest rates at their next meeting. In the minutes released Wednesday afternoon, policymakers also appeared to shirk the prospects of adopting formal yield curve targets in the near-term. Treasury yields fell Thursday morning.

US central bankers agreed that “the ongoing public health crisis would weigh heavily on economic activity, employment, and inflation in the near term and was posing considerable risks to the economic outlook over the medium term.”” data-reactid=”22″>On the US economy, US central bankers agreed that “the ongoing public health crisis would weigh heavily on economic activity, employment, and inflation in the near term and was posing considerable risks to the economic outlook over the medium term.”

“Despite evident concerns that the resurgence in infections could weigh on the economy, the majority of officials were content to wait for more incoming information,” Paul Ashworth, Capital Economics chief US economist, said in a note. “With the infection rate falling again, there may be less urgency to add to the monetary policy stimulus. But the other thing that stands out from the minutes is that Fed officials still believe ‘strong fiscal policy support’ is ‘necessary to encourage expeditious improvements in labor market condition. With Congress failing to extend the fiscal stimulus, more of the burden will fall to monetary policy.”

Labor Department’s weekly unemployment claims report. Consensus economists expect another 920,000 individuals filed new jobless claims last week, coming in below the 1 million mark for a second time since the start of the pandemic, but holding still well above the pre-pandemic record of 665,000 new claims from March 2009.

TGT) rallied 12.7% to close at a record high Wednesday, after the big-box retailer reported its fastest-ever sales growth in the second quarter, driven by a 195% surge in e-commerce sales. Shares added mostly to gains in pre-market trading. Lowe’s (LOW) shares closed modestly higher, but edged slightly lower Thursday morning, after the home-improvement giant reported a 35% jump in US DIY comparable sales, driven by a surge in consumers taking on redecorating projects during the pandemic.

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7:21 a.m. ET: Alibaba quarterly results top estimates as core commerce business ‘fully recovered to pre-Covid-19 levels’

second-quarter sales and profit that handily topped estimates, as a recovery in Chinese consumer spending helped the e-commerce giant’s core business return to pre-pandemic levels of performance.” data-reactid=”30″>Alibaba (BABA) posted second-quarter sales and profit that handily topped estimates, as a recovery in Chinese consumer spending helped the e-commerce giant’s core business return to pre-pandemic levels of performance.

Quarterly sales grew 34% to 153.75 billion yuan, or about $21.8 billion, and topped estimates for 148.06 billion yuan. Adjusted earnings of 14.82 yuan were better than the 13.79 yuan expected. Mobile monthly active users grew to 874 million, beating estimates by about 3 million.

“Our domestic core commerce business has fully recovered to pre-COVID-19 levels across the board, while cloud computing revenue grew 59% year-over-year,” Maggie Wu, chief financial officer of Alibaba Group, said in a statement. “Our strong profit growth and cash flow enable us to continue to strengthen our core business and invest for long term growth.”

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