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U.S. equity futures moved higher in early Monday trading, while Treasury bond yields tested multi-month peaks, as investors looked to a key week of jobs data that could define the market’s near-term interest rate forecasts.
Stocks ended higher on Friday, with the S&P 500 rising 1.26% to snap its longest losing streak since April and put the benchmark into positive territory for the month. The so-called ‘Santa Claus rally’, however, failed to materialize, with stocks ending around 0.5% lower from their closing levels the day before Christmas Eve.
Bond markets are likely to be the key focus on Wall Street this week, however, with around $119 billion in coupon auctions expected from the U.S. Treasury, including a key sale of $39 billion in 10-year notes, as well as a spate of labor market reading for the final months of the year.Â
The Labor Department will cap those off Friday with its December employment report, where economists are expecting to see 150,000 new hires and a headline jobless rate of 4.2%.
A hotter-than-expected reading, particularly with respect to wages, could stoke renewed inflation concerns and push Treasury yields, which are already testing 8-month highs, further into recently uncharted territory.
Benchmark 10-year notes were last marked at 4.614% heading into the start of the New York trading session, with 2-year paper trading at 4.328%.Â
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six global currencies, was marked 0.31% lower at 108.612, although much of the movement was tied to a surge in the Canadian dollar.
The loonie was last marked 0.54% higher at 1.4370 following reports that embattled Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will resign early this week.
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On Wall Street, tech stocks are once again pacing the early advance, with Nvidia (NVDA)  rising 1.9% ahead of a keynote address from CEO Jensen Huang later in the day and Microsoft (MSFT)  rising 1.1% on reports it will spend another $80 billion on new data centers as part of it AI investment efforts.
Futures contracts tied to the S&P 500, which is now up just over 1% for the month, are priced for a 24 point opening bell gain while those linked to the Dow Jones Industrial Average suggest a 5 point dip. The tech-focused Nasdaq, meanwhile, is called 155 point higher.
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In overseas markets, Europe’s Stoxx 600 slipped 0.11% in Frankfurt following disappointing economic activity data for the month of December, while Britain’s FTSE 100 edged 0.1% lower in mid-day London trading.
Overnight in Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 reopened for the first time in 2025 with a 1.47% decline, while China stocks slumped to a four month low on renewed concerns for the health of the world’s second-largest economy.
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