U.S. stock futures were flat and swung between gains and losses on Friday following Thursday’s decline. The S&P 500 futures were trading a little below the flatline whereas other indices were in green.

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. (NASDAQ:BABA) shares jumped 14.56% in Hong Kong on Friday after exceeding the street’s expectations on Thursday. Other Chinese tech companies also rallied.

Gold neared the $3000 per ounce mark amid President Donald Trump and Elon Musk‘s remarks to visit the Forth Knox for the inspection of precious bullion reserves.

The 10-year Treasury yield stood at 4.49%, while the two-year yield was at 4.26%. According to the CME Group's FedWatch tool, there is a 97.5% chance that the Federal Reserve will keep interest rates unchanged for the March meeting.

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSE:SPY) and Invesco QQQ Trust ETF (NASDAQ:QQQ), which track the S&P 500 index and Nasdaq 100 index, respectively, fell in premarket on Thursday. SPY was up 0.049% to $610.68, and QQQ advanced 0.12% to $537.88, according to Benzinga Pro data.

Cues From The Last Session

Sectors drove U.S. stock declines Thursday, with financials, consumer discretionary, and staples leading losses. Conversely, the energy and real estate sectors gained.

Jobless claims for the week ending Feb. 15 rose to 219,000, above the 215,000 estimate, and the Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Index sharply declined to 18.1

Walmart Inc. (NASDAQ:WMT) shares plunged 6.53% despite beating expectations as the retail giant’s growth forecast for the fiscal year 2026 was below the consensus.

Insights From Analysts

“Volatility doesn't equal a permanent financial loss unless you sell,” said Peter Mallouk, in an X post.

CEO at Creative Planning, Mallouk shared a chart in an X post showing that the S&P 500 index has fallen 58% in 1930, 49% in 2008, and 34% in 2020, but despite these sharp declines it has returned an average of 10% per year since 1928.

Ryan Detrick, the chief market strategist at Carson Research highlighted that the second half of February is usually riskier for the S&P 500 returns. He mapped the data from 1950 to 2024, which showed that on average, the index has declined consistently after peaking on Feb. 15.

Highlighting the fixed income opportunities, Scott Wren, the senior global market strategist at Wells Fargo said that investors should move money out of short-term instruments and into higher-yielding investment-grade fixed income further out on the maturity spectrum.

“We have conviction around our year-end target range of 4.50% – 5.00% for the U.S. 10-year Treasury note, and on that basis, we see attractive fixed-income opportunities for investors,” he said.

See Also: How to Trade Futures

Upcoming Economic Data

Here’s what investors will keep an eye on Friday:

• February’s S&P flash U.S. services PMI and manufacturing PMI will be out by 9:45 a.m., ET.

• The final consumer sentiment data for February and existing home sales data for January will be out by 10:00 a.m., ET.

• Fed Vice Chairman Philip Jefferson will speak again and San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly will also speak for the second time this week at 11:30 a.m., ET.

Stocks In Focus:

• Telephone and Data Systems Inc. (NYSE:TDS) was up 0.18% in the premarket on Friday ahead of its earnings, which will be released before the opening bell. Analysts expect it to report a quarterly loss of 28 cents per share on the revenue of $1.25 billion.

• Vipshop Holdings Ltd. ADR (NYSE:VIPS) jumped 10.19% as Wall Street expects it to report quarterly earnings of 82 cents per share on revenue of $4.77 billion before the opening bell.

• Brady Corp. (NYSE:BRC) was 0.09% higher ahead of its earnings, which will be released before the opening bell. Analysts expect it to report quarterly earnings of $1.03 per share on revenue of $359.11 million.

• United States Cellular Corp. (NYSE:USM) advanced 2.89% as Wall Street expects it to report a quarterly loss of 5 cents per share on the revenue of $965.87 million after the closing bell.

• Dropbox Inc. (NASDAQ:DBX) plunged 10.29% despite reporting better-than-expected earnings as its total annual recurring revenue decreased by $4.8 million quarter-over-quarter.

• Celsius Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:CELH) zoomed 32.28% after reporting a record 2024 revenue of $1.36 billion due to high demand for its functional beverages and acquired Alani Nu for $1.65 billion to expand its brand portfolio.

• COPT Defense Properties (NYSE:CDP) rallied by 30.94% as it increased its quarterly dividend by 3.4% to $0.305 per share for Q1 2025, payable April 16th to shareholders. This equates to an annualized dividend of $1.22 per share.

• Soluna Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:SLNH) rose 1.38% and Bit Digital Inc. (NASDAQ:BTBT) advanced 1.02% as the companies expanded their partnership with a new 12-month, 5.5 MW hosting contract at Project Dorothy, Texas, bringing their total hosted capacity to over 12 MW.

Commodities, Gold And Global Equity Markets:

Crude oil futures were trading lower in the early New York session by 0.90% to hover around $71.83 per barrel.

The gold spot index was down by 0.31% to $2,929.69 per ounce after hitting a fresh record of $2,949.87. The Dollar Index was up 0.26% at 106.651 level.

Asian markets ended mostly higher on Friday. Except for Australia's ASX 200, and India's S&P BSE Sensex index, all indices including, China's CSI 300, South Korea's Kospi, Hong Kong's Hang Seng, and Japan's Nikkei 225 index rose. European markets were mixed in trade.

Read Next:

• Gold Is An ‘Essential Component’ Of Portfolio, Says Expert As It Nears $3000 While Trump, Musk Suggest Fort Knox Inspection Amid The Surge

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