(News Bulletin 247) – Wall Street is expected in the green Thursday morning in the wake of good results from Meta and GDP figures suggesting a sharp slowdown in growth likely to encourage the Fed to lower its rates.

Half an hour before the opening, the futures contracts on the major New York indices are advancing from 0.5% to 1%, announcing a start to the session in positive territory.

According to the Commerce Department’s first-ever estimate, US GDP grew at an annualized rate of 1.1% in the first quarter, marking a slowdown from 2.6% in the last quarter of 2022.

A priori, these data slightly strengthen the prospect of seeing the US Federal Reserve proceed with a rate cut after the end of its monetary tightening cycle, scheduled for next week.

But analysts relativize this deceleration, which they attribute to purely temporary factors.

‘The most penalizing element comes from the significant drop in the constitution of stocks, while household consumption remains particularly solid’, argue the Commerzbank teams.

The statistics also favor a rebound in the dollar and bond yields, that of ten-year Treasury bonds rising above 3.47%.

The start of the day was also driven by a new wave of earnings releases, this time rather well received by investors.

The biopharmaceutical giant Merck thus raised and tightened its adjusted EPS target range for the whole of 2023 on the occasion of the publication of first quarter results supported by oncology and vaccines.

The diversified industrial group Honeywell has also announced that it has raised its annual objectives after having done better than expected in the first three months of the financial year.

Very prominent in pre-opening, Meta climbed 15% in pre-market quotes after reporting quarterly profit well above estimates, reassuring investors about its ability to continue to generate growth.

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