Investing.com – U.S. futures pointed to a higher open on Monday as a light calendar day with no major economic data and few earnings reports left investors digesting remarks from Federal Reserve (Fed) officials, while oil jumped on supply concern as Canadian forest fires cut output.
The blue-chip Dow futures gained 45 points, or 0.025%, by 10:51AM GMT, or 6:51AM ET, the S&P 500 futures rose 5 points, or 0.25%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures traded up 12 points, or 0.29%.
In an interview with The New York Times published on Sunday, New York Fed chief William Dudley said it was a “reasonable expectation” for the U.S. central bank to raise rates twice this year.
Chicago Fed president Charles Evans showed an upbeat outlook on the U.S. economy on Monday, though he was concerned about the inflation outlook and insisted that the Federal Reserve’s current stance of waiting to observe the data before making further moves to remove accommodative policy was appropriate.
Even though Friday’s nonfarm payrolls caused traders to cut the odds of a rate hike at the next meeting in June to just 6%, some Fed officials had kept the possibility on the table.
Bond guru Bill Gross warned in an interview with Bloomberg on Friday that he wasn’t “so sure that June is out.”
“Yellen, more than jobs, is focused on wages. At 2.5%, they’re moving up,” he said.
In another appearance on Monday, Minneapolis Fed president Neel Kashkari will give a speech to the Economic Club of Minnesota at 17:00GMT, or 13:00ET.
Oil prices rallied on Monday, as huge wildfires in rural Canada continued to hit supply from the country's vast oil sands reserves.
At least 645,000 barrels a day of oil-sands production had been sidelined, based on public announcements, but the true figure may be closer to one million barrels a day, or nearly half of Canada’s total 2.5 million barrels a day in oil-sands output.
U.S. crude futures gained 2.08% to $45.59 by 10:53AM GMT, or 6:53AM ET, while Brent oil traded up 1.54% to $46.07.
Dun&Bradstreet, Hertz Global, Sotheby’s, Teva Pharma and Tyson Foods were among a handful of companies scheduled to report earnings on Monday.