US open: Stocks mixed ahead of busy week for earnings
Wall Street stocks were mixed after the opening bell on Monday ahead of some key corporate earnings later in the week.
As of 1530 GMT, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.26% at 30,917.49, while the S&P 500 was 0.41% firmer at 3,857.22 and the Nasdaq Composite came out the gate 1.24% stronger at 13,710.93.
The Dow opened 79.49 points lower on Monday, extending losses recorded at the tail end of last week after new President Joe Biden got to work on pushing his proposed $1.9trn stimulus package through Congress.
With things being quiet on the earnings front on Monday, market participants were looking for updates on the aforementioned stimulus programme and mulling over the Covid-19 pandemic itself.
Joe Biden's pick for surgeon general said over the weekend that the US would have to race to keep up with the now mutating coronavirus.
"The virus is basically telling us that it's going to continue to change and we've got to be ready for it," said Dr Vivek Murthy. "We've got to number one, do much better genomic surveillance, so we can identify variants when they arise and that means we've got to double down on public health measures like masking and avoiding indoor gatherings."
The US has now recorded more than 25.7m confirmed cases of Covid-19, claiming the lives of roughly 429,515 Americans in the process.
In the corporate space, quarterly results from Apple, Microsoft, Netflix, Tesla, McDonald's, Honeywell, Caterpillar and Boeing were all slated for release this week.
When discussing the impending earnings onslaught, AvaTrade's Naeem Aslam said: "Coronavirus remains the number one risk for the US economy, and that is likely to have an adverse influence on earnings. But tech stocks should continue to show positive influence as Covid-19 has shifted the technology curve even furthermore people have adopted a new behaviour.
"We were supposed to see this in 10 years-- working from home has become a norm now. Even after 100.0m Americans will get their vaccination during the first 100 days of Biden's presidency, US corporates are going to allow workers to work from home. This means much faster growth of new technological solutions."
On the macro front, the Chicago Fed's national activity index for December edged higher to 0.52 from 0.31 in November, while the Dallas Fed's January manufacturing index will be released shortly.