Australian shares to open higher after Wall Street advance
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The news: The Australian sharemarket is set to start higher after Wall Street advanced, with a downward revision in US payrolls and the release of minutes from the Federal Reserve’s most recent meeting cementing expectations for a September rate cut.
The numbers: The Dow Jones index ended 0.14% higher, while the broader S&P 500 gained 0.42% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 0.57%. In the local market, ASX 200 futures were up 28 points or 0.35% at 7,993 points at 7am AEST on Thursday.
The context: All three major US stock indices closed modestly higher, with chip stocks boosting the Nasdaq while the Dow's gains were weighted by financial stocks.
In economic news, a US Labor Department revision to payrolls data for the 12 months through March 2024 lowered the 2.9 million payroll ads originally reported by 818,000 - the steepest preliminary downward revision since the global financial crisis, suggesting the apparent softening in the labour market could be more pronounced than previously assumed.
Minutes from the Fed’s July monetary policy meeting suggest Fed officials were already strongly leaning toward a rate cut at the meeting scheduled for September. That sets the stage for the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium to convene later on Thursday, where Fed Chair Jerome Powell will speak on Friday.
In the local market, traders will be focused on earnings reports from Medibank, Sonic Healthcare, Qube, Super Retail and Stockland among others.
The source: Reuters
