Dow Futures down 15 pts; cautious trading ahead of Powell speech By

By Peter Nurse 

-- U.S. stocks are Precious Metals Traderseen opening mixed Wednesday, amid cautious trading ahead of a keenly awaited speech by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell as well as important growth and labor market data.

At 07:00 ET (12:00 GMT), the contract was down 15 points or 0.1%, while traded 8 points or 0.2% higher, and climbed 45 points or 0.4%.

The blue-chip closed largely unchanged on Tuesday, while the broad-based fell 0.2%, and the tech-heavy ended 0.6% lower.

Investors have been keeping an eye on developments in China, amid optimism that authorities in the second largest economy in the world are considering to loosen strict COVID-19 restrictions in the wake of widespread civil unrest.

That said, it will undoubtedly take some time to materially raise vaccination rates there, and thus attention Wednesday will turn to more domestic matters.

Fed Chair is scheduled to deliver a speech at the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at Brookings, and investors will be listening for further clues on monetary policy.

Powell is expected to signal that the U.S. central bank will slow the pace of its interest rate hikes next month but could also imply that the terminal rate will have to be higher than first thought to be sufficiently restrictive and stay there for longer.

The has raised interest rates by 75 basis points at its last four policy-setting meetings, pushing borrowing costs to their highest levels since 2008.

There is also a substantial amount of economic data for investors to digest Wednesday, including ,, and the second estimate of third quarter and prices.

In the corporate sector, earnings are due from the likes of Salesforce (NYSE:), Hormel Foods (NYSE:), Synopsys (NASDAQ:) and Five Below (NASDAQ:), while Airbnb (NASDAQ:) will also be in the spotlight after the company launched a platform allowing renters to offer short-term sublets.

Crude oil prices rose Wednesday, boosted by an industry report showing falling U.S. crude inventories, pointing to tighter supply conditions in the world’s largest consumer of crude.

Data from the , released Tuesday, showed that U.S. crude stocks shrank by a much bigger-than-expected 7.9 million, suggesting that the U.S. government has likely scaled back its drawdowns from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Official government data from the are due to be released later Wednesday.

By 07:00 ET, traded 2.3% higher at $79.97 a barrel, while the contract rose 2.2% to $86.06.

Additionally, rose 1.6% to $1,775.65/oz, while traded 0.3% higher at 1.0357.

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