US pre-open: Stocks on course to hit fresh records on last trading day of 2017

US stocks looked set to hit fresh records on the last trading day of the year, with volumes likely to be extremely light.

At 1340 GMT, Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures were all 0.3% higher.

Looking back on the last year, FXTM research analyst Lukman Otunuga said: “This has certainly been another eventful trading year for financial markets, as investors juggled with numerous themes throughout 2017.

“Market players marched into the trading year adopting a risk-on attitude, amid growing optimism over Donald Trump pushing ahead with a large fiscal spending package. The ‘Trump effect’ not only elevated global stocks to 19-month highs in January, but also sent the dollar to its highest level in 14 years. In February, the series of pending elections in Europe, ongoing Brexit developments and heightened Trump uncertainties, made political risk a recurrent theme during the first quarter of 2017. Although during the same month Trump made promises of a ‘phenomenal’ tax plan, the growing threat of him moving forward with the protectionist policies while overlooking the proposed fiscal stimulus, weighed heavily on investor sentiment.

“It was all about Brexit fuelled anxiety and Trump jitters in March, which ultimately supported safe-haven assets such as gold while investors fled to safety. The Federal Reserve moved forward with a ‘dovish hike’ in the same month which punished the dollar further.”

In corporate news, Progenics rocketed in pre-market trade after the US FDA said it will review the company’s treatment for a rare type of cancer.

Netflix was in focus after the company announced plans to bump up the salary of a number of its top executives next year, pointing to the recently-passed US tax bill. Chief content officer Ted Sarandos will earn a $12m base salary in 2018, having earned $1m a year in the last three years.

Shares in Goldman Sachs were also likely to be in focus as it emerged it will take a $5bn hit from the US tax reforms that kick in next year.

Apple shares could be active after the technology giant apologised for deliberately slowing down some of its older iPhones.