Chip stocks drag down U.S. futures; Stoxx 600 gains
BNN Bloomberg
A slide in chipmakers weighed on stocks, with traders keeping a close eye on any clues about the outlook for monetary policy from major central banks.
The Nasdaq 100 underperformed as Nvidia Corp. led losses in semiconductor shares on a report the US is considering new curbs on the exports of artificial-intelligence chips to China. Micron Technology Inc., which is set to report earnings after the market close, also slipped. Analysts largely expect banks to sail through the Federal Reserve’s stress test, with results coming out later Wednesday.
Traders are also focused on the European Central Bank’s policy panel in Sintra, Portugal — featuring Fed Chair Jerome Powell, ECB’s Christine Lagarde, Bank of England’s Andrew Bailey and Bank of Japan’s Kazuo Ueda.
Mutual funds bought stocks for the first time since February in the past month as fear of missing out outweighed economic concerns, according to Barclays Plc strategists. Still, this hasn’t changed the bigger year-to-date picture of investors mainly flocking to safe assets, they said.
