The Day Ahead

COMING UP IN U.S. - WEEK AHEAD

• U.S. Economic Calendar
  • Friday:
    • Non-farm payrolls: expected 60,000 job growth (February).
    • Private payrolls: probably climbed 65,000 (February).
    • Unemployment rate: expected to rise 4.3% (February).
    • Average hourly earnings: expected to rise 0.3% (February).
    • Retail sales data (January): expected to decline 0.2%; ex-autos, likely rose 0.1%.
    • December business inventories data due.
  • Thursday:
    • Import prices data (January): likely rose 0.2%.
    • Export prices data: likely rose 0.3%.
    • Weekly jobless claims: initial claims likely rose 4,000 to 216,000.
    • Fourth-quarter unit labor costs: likely rose 2%.
    • Labor productivity data: expected to rise 1.9%.
  • Wednesday:
    • ADP National Employment data (February): probably rose to 50,000.
    • S&P composite and services PMI for February.
    • ISM non-manufacturing PMI data: expected 53.5.
  • Various:
    • Challenger layoffs data for February.
• Fed Calendar
  • Tuesday: New York Fed President John Williams and Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari to speak.
  • Friday: Cleveland Fed President Beth Hammack to participate in a panel on the dollar's safe-haven status.
• Earnings
  • Thursday: Costco to post second-quarter revenue.

U.S. TOP NEWS

• OpenAI: $840 billion valuation with $110 billion funding from Amazon, Nvidia, SoftBank.
• Warner Bros Discovery: acquired by Paramount Skydance in a $110 billion deal.
• Trump: directs federal agencies to cease use of Anthropic technology, with a six-month phase-out for Defense Department.
• Target: management under fire from investors amid consumer criticism.
• CoreWeave: shares slumped due to plans to double capital expenditure, raising margin concerns.

MARKET RECAP AT 4 pm ET

• Wall Street: ended lower, driven by tech and financial shares over AI-related cost and disruption concerns.
• Gold: rose on softer Treasury yields.
• Dollar: slipped.
• Oil: jumped on supply risks linked to U.S.-Iran strains.

WEALTH NEWS

• US producer prices: increased strongly in January; non-food/energy goods costs rose most in 3.5 years.
• Trump's Fed chief nominee: Kevin Warsh faces hurdles, adding uncertainty to Powell's term succession.
• Wall Street Week Ahead: AI disruption prospects loom over markets, US jobs data anticipated.
• Blue Owl turmoil: adds strain to the $2 trillion US private credit sector.
• JPMorgan, Barclays, Fifth Third sued by investors for missing "giant red flags" at bankrupt subprime auto lender Tricolor.