U.S. stock futures were little affected by overnight trading Tuesday after record closings of the S&P 500 & Nasdaq Composite during regular trading.
Futures contracts linked to the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained an additional 18 points. S&P 500 futures were slightly higher than Nasdaq 100.
Tuesday's 0.15% gain by the S&P 500 was enough to make it its fourth consecutive positive session. It also reached a record intraday high and closing high. This is the benchmark index's 62nd highest intraday high of this year. The Nasdaq Composite also rose 0.52% and set new intraday records.
Although the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.9%, the benchmark of 30 stocks failed to reach a new milestone. Home Depot was the largest drag.
Although the S&P has set a new record, Christopher Harvey, Wells Fargo Securities' head of equity strategy, sees even more gains in the future. On Tuesday, Harvey raised his year-end goal to 4,825. This is 7.5% more than the index's closing day. Harvey's call was based on the S&P’s August strength continuing into the last months of the year.
"In the past 31 years, nine times have the S&P 500 experienced a price return greater than 10% in the first eight months. The index's average price return over the following four months was +8.4%. In a note to clients, he said that none of these cases produced a negative return in the last four months.
On Thursday, the Jackson Hole symposium will be held. Here central bankers may provide updates about their plans to reduce monetary stimulus. As the economic pandemic hit, the Federal Reserve has been buying at least $120 Billion of bonds each month to reduce longer-term interest rates.
Chairman Jerome Powell will make remarks Friday.
"Taper talk may be the concern, but if inflation runs hot and economic data is mixed, the timing of tapering might get pushed," stated Lindsey Bell (chief investment strategist at Ally Invest). It is unlikely that the Fed will force an economy to taper, as the outlook is less certain due to the rise of the Delta variant.
Bell said that August's jobs report could be the deciding factor, considering that Covid cases rose in the past month due to the spread of the delta variant.
Many tech companies, including the Dow component Salesforce, will report earnings after the market closes on Wednesday. Box and Snowflake will also be reporting earnings.
