Investing.com –Wall Street futures pointed to a slightly higher open on Thursday as investors looked ahead to a slew of data that could give the Federal Reserve (Fed) food for thought ahead of its policy decision next week.
The blue-chip Dow futures gained 58 points, or 0.32%, by 7:12AM ET (11:12AM GMT), the S&P 500 futures rose 7 points, or 0. 33%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures advanced 16 points, or 0.34%.
The most important piece of data Thursday are August retail sales at 8:30AM ET (12:30 GMT) as investors look to gauge the state of the American consumer. The consensus forecast is that the report will show retail sales dipped 0.1% last month, after holding flat in July. Core sales are forecast to inch up 0.2%, after falling 0.3% a month earlier.
Besides the retail sales report, the U.S. will also release data on weekly jobless claims, PPI, the Empire State survey and the Philadelphia Fed survey, all due at the same time.
Industrial production is slated for 9:15AM ET (13:15GMT), while business inventories is due at 10:00AM ET (14:00GMT).
Markets are pricing in just a 12% chance of a rate hike at the Fed’s September 20-21 meeting, according to Investing.com's Fed Rate Monitor Tool. For December, odds fell on Thursday to just 47.4%, compared to 52.9% the prior day, making the February 2017 meeting the first in which the odds pass the 50% threshold.
Elsewhere, market participants were focused on the U.K. as the Bank of England (BoE) kept its benchmark interest rate on hold at a record low of 0.25%, in line with market forecasts, and also made no changes to its £435 billion asset purchase program as expected. However, the BoE did note that a majority of its members expect a further rate cut this year if incoming data comes in line with its expectations.
That came after the country’s retail sales registered its largest annual increase in 11 months during August and economists pushed back the chances of a recession in the coming year to 35%, down from 60% in a July poll.
Earlier, Asian shares ended mixed in holiday-thinned trade, as investors remained cautious before the Federal Reserve and the Bank of Japan policy setting meetings next week. Markets in China, Taiwan and South Korea were closed for public holidays.
Meanwhile, oil prices rebounded on Thursday after having tumbled 3% on the back of the prior day’s weekly inventory data.
U.S. crude futures traded up 0.55% to $43.82 by 7:13AM ET (11:13AM GMT), while Brent oil gained 0.87% to $46.24.