US pre-open: Stocks seen muted ahead of data, Yellen

US futures pointed to a muted open ahead of another speech by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen and a slew of data releases.

At 1125 GMT, Dow Jones Industrial Average futures were up 0.1%, S&P 500 futures were down 0.1% and Nasdaq futures were flat.

Meanwhile, oil prices retreated, with West Texas Intermediate down 0.5% to $52.92 a barrel and Brent crude off 0.3% to $55.78.

Yellen is due to appear before the House Financial Services panel at 1500 GMT.

Her speech on Tuesday was unexpectedly hawkish. She said a “rate increase will likely be appropriate in upcoming meetings" if the economic recovery stays on course, which saw the dollar rally and US stocks hit new records.

Tony Cross at TopTradr said: “Janet Yellen’s testimony to the Senate banking committee is very much at the centre of attention right now. There were no real surprises yesterday and the expectation would be we’re going to see no deviation from that course today, either. That next US rate hike really should be expected before Easter.”

Aside from Yellen’s speech, investors will be keeping a close eye on the macroeconomic calendar. Retail sales, the consumer price index and NY Empire State manufacturing are at 1330 GMT, while business inventories and the NAHB housing market index are at 1500 GMT.

Spreadex’s Connor Campbell said: “Looking ahead to this afternoon and there is plenty more data to come before the US session gets underway. The most important figure is inflation, which is set to remain at 0.3%; retail sales, meanwhile, are likely to fall from 0.6% to 0.1% month-on-month as consumers deal with the post-Christmas squeeze.

“The Empire State manufacturing index is then set to climb from 6.5 to 7.2, with industrial production forecast to drop to 0.1% from 0.8% in January. The prospect of all this has left the Dow Jones looking a bit meek before the bell, though it is still set to open at yet another 20500-plus high.”

On the corporate front, PepsiCo and SodaStream International were among the companies slated to report earnings ahead of the opening bell.

After the close, numbers are due from Cisco Systems and Kraft-Heinz.

Elsewhere, Fortress Investment Group could be in focus after Japan’s SoftBank agreed to buy the asset manager for $3.3bn.

Hilton Worldwide was also likely to be active after it posted a 2.2% jump in quarterly revenue ahead of the open.