By Peter Nurse
Investing.com - U.S. stocks are seen opening largely unchanged Monday, starting a new week near record levels as investors digest a potential infrastructure package ahead of Friday’s key payrolls report.
At 7:05 AM ET (1105 GMT), the Dow Futures contract was down 25 points, or 0.1%, S&P 500 Futures traded 2 points, or 0.1%, higher, and Nasdaq 100 Futures climbed 40 points, or 0.3%.
The S&P 500 ended Friday up 0.3% at a closing record high, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained more than 200 points, or 0.7%, to sit less than 2% from its record. The Nasdaq Composite closed marginally lower, but it still added over 2% last week.
Helping the tone was President Joe Biden over the weekend rowing back on the idea that he would veto a new $1.2 trillion bipartisan deal, announced late Thursday, if a separate Democratic spending plan didn’t also pass through Congress.
This would make it easier for Republicans to support the package in a deeply-divided Senate, paving the way for fresh investment in roads, bridges and broadband internet.
Still, volatility is likely to be limited in the near term as investors focus on the release of the key monthly jobs report at the end of the week, with an improvement in the labor market needed before the Federal Reserve decides to change its monetary policies.
The June nonfarm payrolls report is expected to show that the economy added 675,000 new jobs, pushing the unemployment rate down to 5.7% from 5.8%, while average hourly earnings are seen rising 0.3% on the month, after rising by 0.5% the previous month.
In corporate news, Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) will be in the spotlight after the drugmaker agreed over the weekend to pay $230 million to settle claims that it fueled the opioid crisis.
Additionally, United Airlines (NASDAQ:UAL) is on the verge of agreeing airplane orders potentially worth $30 billion in a bid to secure extra capacity at favorable prices, Reuters reported.
GameStop (NYSE:GME) will also be in focus after the video game retailer, a volatile meme stock, was moved to the Russell 1000 index, with the change becoming effective Monday.
Crude oil prices traded basically flat Monday, near more than 2-year highs, ahead of the week’s meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies, a group known as OPEC.
By 6 AM ET, U.S. crude was down 0.1% at $73.98 a barrel, just off the recent high of $74.45, the highest since June 2018, while Brent was 0.3% lower at $75.38, after climbing to $76.60 late Friday, its highest since October 2018.
OPEC+ is scheduled to meet on Thursday, and is likely to further ease current supply curbs as the fuel demand outlook continues to improve and prices rise.