Stock Futures Flat Following Rough Week
After a rocky beginning to the last week of February trading, stock futures remained mostly unchanged on Monday night.
Futures linked to the Dow Jones Industrial Average increased by 45 points, roughly 0.1%. Similarly, S&P 500 futures and Nasdaq 100 futures also saw a slight uptick of 0.1% each.
During the regular trading session, major averages fell amid renewed worries about the impact of artificial intelligence on various sectors. Additionally, escalating tensions between the United States and Iran made traders uneasy, particularly after President Trump hinted at raising global tariffs to 15%.
The Dow closed down about 822 points, or around 1.7%, largely influenced by a 13% drop in IBM’s stock. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite and the S&P 500 each fell by about 1%, pushing the latter into negative territory for the year.
Software companies, including Microsoft and CrowdStrike, experienced significant losses, as did several cybersecurity and financial firms.
“The market seems to have lost its momentum. It’s stuck in this trading range… and there’s a really unhealthy rotation occurring,” noted Warren Paiz, co-founder and strategist at ThreeFourteen Research, during an appearance on CNBC’s “Closing Bell.” He pointed out that energy and consumer staples had seen double-digit growth quarter-over-quarter, while technology and financial sectors appeared weaker.
“I think we should probably take a step back, reduce risk, and wait for this range to sort itself out. For it to resolve positively, it likely needs to be driven by technology,” he added. “As long as tech and financial sectors behave like this, I don’t see any way out of this situation.”
Paiz, who downgraded U.S. stocks to a “neutral” stance earlier this month, believes that tech stocks carry potential for growth due to solid fundamentals and improved productivity. “It seems like a healthy pullback and consolidation phase. Still, the cautious approach would be to observe whether the market breaks through that range decisively,” he mentioned.
As Tuesday approaches, traders are gearing up for notable events hosted by Anthropic, the AI company behind Claude, which is set to unveil new products and showcase Claude’s latest features. This anticipation, coupled with potential upheaval, has affected the software sector.
Investors are also looking forward to consumer confidence data and updates from Home Depot. They are preparing for key earnings reports from companies like Nvidia and software firms such as Salesforce and Snowflake, which are scheduled to be released later this week, likely influencing market movements amid the ongoing tech sector volatility.
