Wall St. set to rise on trade deal relief; business activity data eyed

Wall Street’s main indexes were set to rise on Tuesday as investors took heart from reassurances that the Phase 1 trade agreement with China was intact, while upbeat business activity data from Europe boded well for US surveys due later.

“The China Trade Deal is fully intact,” US President Donald Trump tweeted late on Monday after White House adviser Peter Navarro sparked confusion by saying the deal was over, roiling risk assets globally and sending S&P stock futures down as much as 1.7%.

While heightened tensions between Washington and Beijing this year have been a cause for concern, monetary and fiscal support worth trillions of dollars, businesses restarting and encouraging economic data have lifted the benchmark S&P 500 about 42% higher from its pandemic low hit in March. It is now just about 8% below its February 19 record high.

A boost from technology stocks helped Wall Street’s three major indexes close higher on Monday, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq registering its fourth record closing high this month.

“There’s a lot of money on the sidelines and as the country reopens, as the economy recovers, that money will be forced back in and that’s why we have a little bit more room to run here,” said Thomas Hayes, managing member at Great Hill Capital LLC in New York. “And then probably, we start to take a rest towards the end of the summer for a little bit before the economy truly starts to catch up to where the market is.”

After European stock markets were boosted by better-than-feared business activity surveys for June, all eyes will be on US manufacturing and services sector PMI numbers, due 9:45 a.m. ET (1345 GMT).

At 8:12 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 311 points, or 1.2%. S&P 500 e-minis were up 32 points, or 1.03% and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 70.5 points, or 0.7%.

Among premarket movers, Nike Inc. rose 2% as brokerages raised their price targets ahead of quarterly results on Thursday.

Translate Bio soared 54% on plans to expand a vaccine collaboration with Sanofi in a deal that could earn the US biotech company more than $2 billion from the French drugmaker.

Boeing Co.’s top supplier Spirit AeroSystems Holdings slipped 5.3% after it said it was seeking relief from lenders as its finances were stretched by the COVID-19 pandemic and a 737 MAX production halt.

Micron Technology Inc. slipped 0.9% as BMO downgraded the chipmaker’s shares to “market perform.” (Reuters)