US pre-open: Futures mixed ahead of Easter break
By Iain Gilbert
Date: Thursday 17 Apr 2025
(Sharecast News) - Wall Street futures were mixed ahead of the bell on Thursday as traders get set to pack up for the Easter long-weekend break.
As of 1300 BST, Dow Jones futures were down 1.43%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures had the indices opening 0.41% and 0.72% firmer, respectively.
The Dow closed 699.57 points lower on Wednesday after Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell warned that the central bank could very well find itself in somewhat of a quandary when it comes to its efforts to both control inflation and support economic growth.
Powell noted that with elevated uncertainty surrounding the impact of Donald Trump's recently implemented tariffs on the US economy, he now expects to see inflation rise and growth slow, undermining both elements of the Fed's dual mandate of ensuring price stability while maximising employment and making it harder for the central bank to justify loosening monetary policy and further.
"We may find ourselves in the challenging scenario in which our dual-mandate goals are in tension," Powell said. "If that were to occur, we would consider how far the economy is from each goal, and the potentially different time horizons over which those respective gaps would be anticipated to close."
Powell said Trump's tariffs were "likely to move us further away" from its goals for "the balance of this year" but gave no insight as to where he sees interest rates headed, noting that, for the time being, the Fed was "well positioned to wait for greater clarity before considering any adjustments" to its policy stance.
Trump later said the termination of Powell's termination "can't come fast enough", raising the question of whether he intends to replace Powell when his term expires in 2026 or outright fire him, which the Fed head has repeatedly cautioned would be illegal.
On the macro front, weekly jobless claims data and the Philadelphia Fed's April manufacturing index were slated for release at 1330 BST, as were March building permits and housing starts figures, while February business inventories numbers will follow at 1500 BST.
In the corporate space, UnitedHealth, DR Horton, American Express and Netflix were all scheduled to report earnings on Thursday.
Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com
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