U.S. stock futures were mostly weaker Friday, with tech stocks experiencing the largest pull on worries on how rising interest rates will impact heady valuations.
What’s happening
- Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average YM00, +0.02% rose 27 points, or 0.1%, to 35818
- Futures on the S&P 500 ES00, -0.19% slipped 0.1%, or 6 points, to 4654
- Futures on the Nasdaq 100 NQ00, -0.67% dropped 0.6%, or 94 points, to 15772.
On Thursday, the Dow DJIA, -0.08% eased 30 points, or 0.1%, to 35898, the S&P 500 SPX, -0.87% lost 0.9%, or 41 points, to 4669 and the Nasdaq Composite COMP, -2.47% slumped 2.5%, or 385 points, to 15180.
What’s driving markets
Thursday saw a steepening of the yield curve and outperformance of value stocks over momentum — a pattern that’s been evident in different parts of this year when investors expected more hawkish central bank policy. The Fed on Wednesday quickened the pace of its bond taper and forecast three interest-rate hikes next year.
“We see risk of a bearish steepening of the yield curve. This reinforces our negative view on duration and is generally positive for value equities relative to growth equities,” said fund managers at Amundi, Europe’s largest fund manager.
It’s not just the Fed responding to faster inflation. Thursday featured rate hikes coming out of Mexico, Norway and the U.K., and the European Central Bank pledging next year to reduce the rate of bond purchases.
Also of note, U.S. Steel X, +3.76% warned of a “temporary slowdown” in orders during the fourth quarter.