Investing.com – Wall Street futures pointed to a higher open on Friday, starting off September with a continuation of a rally that has seen both the Dow and S&P log a streak of five positive months, while investors looked ahead to the monthly jobs report.
The blue-chip Dow futures gained 51 points, or 0.23%, at 6:51AM ET (10:51GMT), the S&P 500 futures rose 5 points, or 0.18%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures traded up 12 points, or 0.20%.
The U.S. Labor Department will release its August nonfarm payrolls report at 8:30AM ET (12:30GMT) on Friday.
The consensus forecast is that the data will show jobs growth of 180,000 this month, following an increase of 209,000 in July, with the unemployment rate forecast to hold steady at 4.3%.
Most of the focus will likely be on average hourly earnings figures, which are expected to rise 0.2% after gaining 0.3% a month earlier and maintain a 2.5% rise year-on-year.
Despite the solid job market, wage inflation has lagged, making markets skeptical that the Federal Reserve will indeed to follow through with its forecast of one more rate hike this year.
While markets appear to have priced in the fact the Fed is expected to make an announcement regarding the start of winding down its balance sheet at the September 20 policy decision, Fed fund futures continue to put the odds of an increase in interest rates by the end of the year at only 39%, according to Investing.com’s Fed Rate Monitor Tool.
Apart from the monthly employment report, investors will focus on the publication of ISM manufacturing sector activity for August at 10:00AM ET (14:00GMT) Friday. Expectations are for a slight pick-up growth with the index inching up to 56.5 from the prior 56.3.
Also scheduled for release Friday are data including construction spending for July along with revisions to both IHS Markit’s manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI) for August and the University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment index for the same month.
While waiting for the data, the dollar showed cautious trade. The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, slipped 0.01% to 92.58 by 6:54AM ET (10:54GMT)
Oil prices fell on Friday in the wake of Hurricane Harvey, which has killed more than 40 people and brought record flooding to the oil heartland of Texas, paralyzing over a quarter of the U.S. refining industry.
Harvey, downgraded to a tropical storm and losing steam as it moved inland, shut at least 4.4 million barrels per day (bpd) of refining capacity, according to company reports and Reuters estimates.
That sparked fears of a fuel shortage ahead of the Labor Day weekend, but also cut refinery demand for crude oil, placing downward pressure on black gold.
U.S. crude futures traded down 0.97% to $46.77 by 6:55AM ET (10:55GMT), while Brent oil traded down 0.57% to $52.56.
Market participants will also keep an eye on the state of U.S. shale production when Baker Hughes releases its most recent rig count data, for the week leading up to Harvey hitting the mainland, later on Friday.
Elsewhere, European bourses traded higher on the back of some positive news from French media company Vivendi (PA:VIV) and the resilient manufacturing data. At 6:56AM ET (10:56GMT), the European benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 gained 0.74%, Germany’s DAX rose 0.75%, while London's FTSE 100 traded up 0.24%.
Earlier, Asian shares closed higher on Friday with regional manufacturing figures aiding sentiment and the market, though traders showed caution ahead of the U.S. employment report.