Stock Market Today: Stocks slide and oil slumps as growth risks accelerate

The resilient U.S. economy is starting to show cracks in its post-pandemic growth story, and markets are paying attention.

Jun 4, 2024 - 18:30

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Stock Market Today: Stocks slide and oil slumps as growth risks accelerate

Check back for updates throughout the trading day

U.S. equity futures moved lower Tuesday, trailing downside moves in both oil and the dollar, as investors look to weakening economic data that could suggest the domestic growth story faces stiffening headwinds into the second half.

Updated at 8:47 AM EDT

Intel: Enter Xenon

Intel shares are moving higher in early trading, but remain more than 40% lower for the year and 35% south over the past five years, as the chipmaker looks to reverse its longtime slump by taking the AI fight directly to rivals Nvidia (NVDA) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) with a new lineup of chips priced at a heavy discount.

Intel shares were last marked 1.4% higher in premarket trading to indicate an opening bell price of $30.71 each.

Stock Market Today

Stocks ended mixed at the close of the Monday session, with tech-led gains for the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq partly offset by another pullback for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, tied in part to softening manufacturing data.

Wall Street will track the first of three job market data releases Tuesday as the Labor Department publishes its April Jolts report.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images

The Institute for Supply Management's benchmark survey of factory activity in May showed another contraction, but the steeper-than-expected decline, as well as elevated price pressures, added to the market's nascent stagflation concern.

The Atlanta Fed's GDPNow forecasting tool, meanwhile, trimmed its current-quarter growth estimate to 1.8%, not far off the 1.3% pace the economy ended with over the first quarter.

The softening outlook, as well as a move by the OPEC cartel to open the door to unwinding production cuts, pulled oil prices firmly lower in overnight dealing. WTI crude futures for July delivery were falling $1.64 to $72.58 per barrel.

Treasury note yields continued their recent slide as well, with 10-year notes easing to 4.391% and 2-year paper trading at 4.81%.

The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six global currencies, was marked 0.14% higher in the overnight session but is trading near two-month lows at 104.291.

The moves are also boosting the odds of a Federal Reserve rate cut in September, as investors bet that slowing growth will lead to a rise in unemployment and softer inflation prospects.

CME Group's FedWatch now pegs the chances of a September reduction at around 61.5%, but sees no chance in the Fed's current rate of 5.25% to 5.5% either next week or in July.

Heading into the start of the trading day on Wall Street, futures contracts tied to the S&P 500 suggest a 25-point opening-bell decline with a 190-point pullback for the Dow.

The tech-focused Nasdaq, meanwhile, is called 85 points lower, with an outsized gain for Intel (INTC) keeping the pullback in check.

More Wall Street Analysts:

In Europe, the regionwide Stoxx 600 was marked 0.84% lower in Frankfurt, with energy stocks trading at a two-month low, while Britain's FTSE 100 down 0.54% in London.

Overnight in Asia, Japan's Nikkei 225 edged 0.22% lower in Tokyo. The regionwide MSCI ex-Japan benchmark fell 1.44% into the close of trading, weighed down by a big decline in India markets amid the likely narrower-than-expected electoral win for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.