Stock index futures were indicating a mixed open for Wall Street Thursday as the upward momentum from the prior session continued to wane.
S&P 500 futures were up about 1 point to 1409, but were also roughly a point below fair value. Nasdaq 100 futures were adding 6 points at 2002, and were fractionally above fair value.
Last time out, the major indices rallied strongly for most of the session thanks to encouraging inflation data, until the final hour, when profit-taking deflated most of those gains.
Content Continues Below
At the end of the day, the
Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 66 points to 12,898, and the S&P 500 climbed 6 points to 1409. The
Nasdaq Composite edged up 2 points to 2497.
As the new day began, investors were mulling reports that billionaire investor Carl Icahn -- who was said earlier this week to have begun acquiring large amounts of
Yahoo! (YHOO) stock -- has lined up 10 possible directors to nominate as replacements for the Internet company's board. Yahoo! shares were up 1.7% in the premarket.
Icahn's interest came after
Microsoft (MSFT) walked away from its merger offer for Yahoo!.
Elsewhere, Britain-based bank
Barclays (BCS) lost 3.3% after reporting a $1.94 billion writedown and saying its first-quarter profit had withered from last year.
As for economic data, the New York
Federal Reserve is set to release its state's manufacturing data at 8:30 a.m EDT. At the same time, initial jobless claims are due from the Labor Department, and the U.S. Treasury's net foreign purchases data should come at 9 a.m. EDT.
Among commodities, crude oil was up 66 cents to $124.88 a barrel, and gold futures were off 20 cents at $866.30. The U.S. dollar slipped against both the euro and the yen.
Treasury prices were falling. The 10-year note dipped 3/32 in price to yield 3.93%, and the 30-year bond gave up 8/32 in price, yielding 4.63%.
Markets abroad were mixed. In Asia, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 added 0.9% overnight, but the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong slipped 0.1%. As for European bourses, London's FTSE 100 climbed 0.2%. Germany's Xetra Dax and the Paris Cac, however, lost 0.3% and 0.1%, respectively.
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