{"id":48174,"date":"2026-03-19T11:35:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T11:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/19\/dow-futures-muted-on-thursday-5-things-to-know-before-market-opens\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T11:35:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T11:35:09","slug":"dow-futures-muted-on-thursday-5-things-to-know-before-market-opens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/19\/dow-futures-muted-on-thursday-5-things-to-know-before-market-opens\/","title":{"rendered":"Dow futures muted on Thursday: 5 things to know before market opens"},"content":{"rendered":"
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US stock futures are trading on a muted note on Thursday, a day after the Dow Jones index hit a new low for 2026 in the previous session.<\/p>\n

Dow futures edged down by 21 points, or 0.1%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures slipped 0.1% and 0.2%, respectively.<\/p>\n

The tepid numbers came as the Wall Street indices faced some strong action on Wednesday, after hotter-than-expected PPI data and the Fed’s hawkish stance dragged the stocks down.<\/p>\n

5 things to know before Wall Street opens<\/h2>\n

1. <\/strong>Oil prices are again dominating the headlines amid the conflict in the Middle East.<\/p>\n

Brent crude price surged nearly 8% and is trading over $114 a barrel at the time of writing this report.<\/p>\n

US WTI numbers have also gained and are hovering around $97 a barrel.<\/p>\n

The sharp surge in oil prices followed Iranian missile strikes on Ras Laffan, home to Qatar\u2019s key liquefied natural gas (LNG) processing hub.<\/p>\n

Operations at the Ras Laffan facility, responsible for roughly one-fifth of global LNG supply, were halted after the attack.<\/p>\n

The disruption fueled fresh volatility in energy markets, with European gas prices also jumping more than 35%.<\/p>\n

2. <\/strong>The Federal Reserve held interest rates steady on March 18, keeping the benchmark federal funds rate in the 3.5%\u20133.75% range.<\/a><\/p>\n

The FOMC voted 10-2 in favor of the hold, with Trump appointee Governor Stephen Miran dissenting.<\/p>\n

The decision came against a backdrop of surging oil prices tied to the ongoing Iran conflict and a weak February jobs report.<\/p>\n

The Fed also revised its inflation outlook upward, now projecting its preferred gauge at 2.7% by the end of 2026.<\/p>\n

The updated dot plot showed the median FOMC member pencilling in just one rate cut for the year.<\/p>\n

3. <\/strong>Micron stock witnessed a sharp sell-off after releasing its fiscal second-quarter results<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Despite beating the Wall Street estimates and posting record revenue, the memory giant is over 6% down in pre-market trading on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The plunge came as Micron said it would raise its 2026 capital spending plan, a move that appeared to unsettle investors despite optimism around AI-driven demand.<\/p>\n

4. <\/strong>Alibaba\u2019s December-quarter results showed how expensive its AI pivot is becoming.<\/p>\n

The tech giant missed estimates to post a revenue of 284.8 billion yuan, while the company’s net income plunged 66% from a year earlier.<\/p>\n

The numbers suggest Alibaba is sacrificing near-term profitability as it pours tens of billions of dollars into AI.<\/p>\n

For investors, the key question is whether these investments can drive faster cloud growth and stronger adoption of AI products.<\/p>\n

It also comes down to whether Alibaba can win a broader re-rating beyond its core e-commerce business.<\/p>\n

5. <\/strong>Globally, fear sentiment dominated among the investors as most of the indexes witnessed a sharp sell-off.<\/p>\n

European markets took a hit on Thursday as the conflict involving Iran intensified. <\/p>\n

The Stoxx 600 dropped more than 2% by mid-morning in London, with losses across almost every major market.<\/p>\n

The story was similar for Asia, where tech stocks led the losers with South Korea\u2019s memory chip leaders SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics dropping 2.23% and 1.8%.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The post Dow futures muted on Thursday: 5 things to know before market opens<\/a> appeared first on Invezz<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US stock futures are trading on a muted note on Thursday, a day after the Dow Jones index hit a new low for 2026 in the previous session. Dow futures edged down by 21 points, or 0.1%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures slipped 0.1% and 0.2%, respectively. The tepid numbers came as the <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48175,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-48174","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-investing"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48174\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}