US open: Stocks find small bid ahead of speech by Fed's Clarida

Stocks are trading slightly higher ahead of a potentially important speech from the US central bank's number two official and despite weak readings on US corporate profits and for pending home sales.

Coming as it did in the wake of the recent inversion in the US Treasury yield curve on the back of global growth concerns triggered by the US-China trade spat, investors were waiting on a speech from the US central bank's number two official, Richard Clarida.

He was due to speak at The Economic Club of New York at 1800 BST, with traders looking for guidance on what the Federal Reserve's next steps might be.

As of 1505 BST, the Dow Jones Industrials was putting on 0.26% or 65.78 points to 25,193, alongside a gain of 0.44% or 12.43 points to 2,7905.30 for the S&P 500, while the Nasdaq Composite was up by 0.52% or 38.98 points to 7,586.85.

Overnight, China's vice foreign minister, Zhang Hanhui, reportedly said that Beijing was against the use of "big sticks" like sanctions, tariffs or protectionism.

"We oppose a trade war but are not afraid of a trade war. This kind of deliberately provoking trade disputes is naked economic terrorism, economic homicide, economic bullying," Zhang reportedly said.

He also accused the US of "economic terrorism".

"This Thursday, China has ramped up trade rhetoric aimed at Washington," said Dean Popplewell, Vice President of Market Analysis at Oanda.

"The much-watched yield gap between U.S 3-month T-Bills and 10’s is sending a warning signal of impending recession now that it slid to a 12-year low yesterday, Popplewell added.

And while it was not necessarily a new measure, on Thursday Bloomberg reported that China had stopped resuming purchases of US soybeans that had been undertaken as a show of good faith.

In terms of fresh economic data, alongside its revised first quarter GDP data, the Commerce Department said that corporate profits declined at a quarterly annualised pace of 10.8% - their worst showing since the last three months of 2015.

According to Commerce, America's GDP expanded at a quarterly annualised pace of 3.1% in the first three months of 2019, which was only a dash lower than its preliminary estimate of 3.2%.

More significantly, a preliminary estimate for core PCE inflation was revised lower, from 1.7% to 1.6%.

On the corporate front meanwhile, top officials at the Department of Justice want T-Mobile and Sprint to help launch a new wireless operator - with its own network - in exchange for greenlighting their $26.5bn tie-up, Bloomberg reported citing a person familiar with the matter.

Still in the same sector, shares of Verizon Communications were knocked lower by a downgrade out of UBS from 'buy' to 'neutral'.

Dow Jones - Risers

Boeing Co. (BA) $351.77 0.82%
Dowdupont Inc. (DWDP) $31.33 0.77%
Caterpillar Inc. (CAT) $122.40 0.76%
Intel Corp. (INTC) $44.56 0.73%
Walmart Inc. (WMT) $102.83 0.69%
Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO) $53.54 0.68%
Apple Inc. (AAPL) $178.47 0.61%
Home Depot Inc. (HD) $191.08 0.57%
Procter & Gamble Co. (PG) $104.77 0.56%
United Technologies Corp. (UTX) $130.04 0.46%

Dow Jones - Fallers

Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) $56.76 -2.44%
Chevron Corp. (CVX) $116.13 -0.50%
Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) $72.01 -0.20%
Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. (WBA) $51.06 -0.14%
International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) $129.54 -0.12%
Pfizer Inc. (PFE) $41.68 -0.10%
Visa Inc. (V) $162.65 -0.05%
Merck & Co. Inc. (MRK) $79.34 -0.03%
American Express Co. (AXP) $117.02 0.03%
Travelers Company Inc. (TRV) $145.15 0.06%

S&P 500 - Risers

Keysight Technologies Inc. (KEYS) $77.94 9.14%
Dollar General Corp (DG) $126.95 7.12%
Dollar Tree Inc (DLTR) $100.31 5.23%
Viacom Inc. Class B (VIAB) $28.88 4.07%
CBS Corp. (CBS) $48.30 3.40%
Edison International (EIX) $60.40 2.96%
Advance Auto Parts (AAP) $160.10 2.82%
Global Payments Inc. (GPN) $151.88 2.80%
Total System Services Inc. (TSS) $121.54 2.79%
CenturyLink Inc. (CTL) $10.67 2.60%

S&P 500 - Fallers

PVH Corp. (PVH) $87.21 -12.13%
Kraft Heinz Co. (KHC) $27.49 -4.15%
Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) $56.76 -2.44%
Marathon Petroleum Corporation (MPC) $48.35 -1.31%
Valero Energy Corp. (VLO) $73.95 -1.23%
Allergan plc (AGN) $124.33 -1.08%
Perrigo Company plc (PRGO) $44.88 -1.08%
Eog Resources Inc. (EOG) $85.72 -0.83%
Cimarex Energy Co (XEC) $61.48 -0.69%
J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. (JBHT) $84.27 -0.67%

Nasdaq 100 - Risers

Dollar Tree Inc (DLTR) $100.31 5.23%
Mercadolibre Inc. (MELI) $587.60 2.44%
Dish Network Corp. (DISH) $35.72 2.44%
Applied Materials Inc. (AMAT) $40.26 2.26%
Ross Stores Inc. (ROST) $92.32 2.24%
Micron Technology Inc. (MU) $33.99 2.11%
Xilinx Inc. (XLNX) $105.69 1.97%
Align Technology Inc. (ALGN) $302.58 1.74%
Lam Research Corp. (LRCX) $180.59 1.68%
Western Digital Corp. (WDC) $40.32 1.66%

Nasdaq 100 - Fallers

Kraft Heinz Co. (KHC) $27.49 -4.15%
Baidu Inc. (BIDU) $111.65 -1.15%
Tesla Inc (TSLA) $188.10 -0.93%
Liberty Global plc Series C (LBTYK) $24.26 -0.82%
J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. (JBHT) $84.27 -0.67%
Liberty Global plc Series A (LBTYA) $24.76 -0.60%
T-Mobile Us, Inc. (TMUS) $75.79 -0.45%
Incyte Corp. (INCY) $77.28 -0.40%
Symantec Corp. (SYMC) $18.95 -0.32%
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc. (REGN) $307.11 -0.22%