Baystreet.ca - Futures for equities in this country index edged up on Tuesday as cautious investors looked ahead to U.S. inflation data due later in the week to infer the U.S. Federal Reserve's monetary policy stance.
The TSX stumbled 231.41 points by the close Monday at 24,536.32, a near four-week low.
The Canadian dollar slid 0.14 cents to 69.47 cents U.S. Tuesday.
March futures eased up 0.1% Tuesday.
Barrick Gold (NYSE:GOLD) on Tuesday confirmed it had suspended operations in Mali and that the government had moved gold stock from the miner's Loulo-Gounkoto site to a bank.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange lost 7.65 points, or 1.3%, to close Monday at 600.77.
ON WALLSTREET
Stock futures rose on Tuesday, as investors braced themselves for the first of two inflation readings due this week.
Futures for the Dow Jones Industrials gained 71 points, or 0.2%, to 42,595.
Futures for the S&P 500 Index took on 11.5 points, or 0.2%, to 5,886.
Futures for the tech-heavy NASDAQ gathered 42.75 points, or 0.2%, to 20,990.
On the earnings front, banking behemoths will kick off fourth-quarter earnings season this week, with JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM), Citigroup (NYSE:C), Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) and Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC) posting results on Wednesday. Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) and Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) are slated to report on Thursday.
Tuesday’s action comes after the NASDAQ slid for the fourth consecutive day in the regular session. Traders rotated out of Big Tech names like Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA), which slid nearly 2%, and snapped up stocks in the energy, health care and materials sectors. The 30-stock Dow rose almost 0.9% as traders bought Chevron (NYSE:CVX) and UnitedHealth (NYSE:UNH)
The producer price index, which measures wholesale inflation, is set for release at 8:30 a.m. ET. Economists polled by Dow Jones predict that headline PPI grew 0.4%, while the core figure, which excludes food and energy, rose 0.3%.
The December PPI measure — and the consumer price index report due Wednesday — will be market catalysts as investors grapple with last week’s blowout jobs report. The upcoming inflation reports will inform the Federal Reserve’s next move on interest rate policy.
Fed funds futures trading suggests a near-certainty that the Fed will hold steady on interest rates at the conclusion of its two-day meeting later this month. Markets pricing also suggests an 80% chance of rates staying at their current target range of 4.25%-4.5% in March.
In Japan, markets returned from a long weekend, the Nikkei 225 index dumping 1.8%, while in Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index gained 1.8%.
Oil prices sagged 20 cents to $78.62 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices acquired $4.40 to $2,683 U.S. an ounce.