US open: Stocks record early gains as investors await update on stimulus talks
Wall Street stocks opened higher on Friday as market participants continued to wait for details regarding a new potential stimulus bill.
As of 1530 BST, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.14% at 28,465.14, while the S&P 500 was 0.41% firmer at 3,460.80 and the Nasdaq Composite came out the gate 0.71% higher at 11,501.91.
The Dow opened 39.63 points higher on Friday, extending gains recorded in the previous session despite some weaker-than-expected jobless figures.
In focus on Friday, Nancy Pelosi's deputy chief of staff said on Thursday that the House Speaker and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had a roughly 40-minute discussion focused on determining whether there was "any prospect of an imminent agreement on a comprehensive bill". During the call, Mnuchin was also said to have "made clear" the President's interest in reaching "an agreement".
Pelosi said earlier that she would oppose aid to US airlines without a broader stimulus package, another thing Trump hinted earlier in the week that he was in favour of.
SpreadEx's Connor Campbell said: "It was a broadly positive end to a bit of a wild week, with most of the Western indices in the green.
"The Dow Jones couldn’t quite make good on the gains suggested by the futures this morning, rising around 60 points instead of the 130 point increase seen at one point early on. That left the index just shy of 28,500, but still at its best price in around a month."
On the macro front, final wholesale inventories for August came in at 0.4%, just shy of estimates for a reading of 0.5%.
In the corporate space, GenMark Diagnostics revealed that the Food and Drug Administration had given the company emergency clearance to run a test that screens for the flu and coronavirus, while Gilead shares were higher after the firm said its anti-viral treatment remdesivir improved Covid-19 recovery time by five days.
Shares in cruiser operators Carnival and Norwegian were higher at the open after the White House revealed Mike Pence would meet with industry officials.