U.S. stocks were little changed on Friday ahead of a shortened trading session.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 85 points, or 0.25%. The S&P 500 lost 0.06% and the Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.56%, weighed down by shares of Activision Blizzard, which fell nearly 4% on news that the FTC could block Microsoft from taking over the gaming company.
In addition, worries about continued lockdowns in China weighed on markets. The country is ramping up covid restrictions after seeing climbing case counts in recent days. Earlier in the week, China reported its first covid deaths since May.
Wall Street looks set to close out an upbeat holiday-shortened week, after the Federal Reserve’s latest meeting minutes added to expectations that monetary policy tightening may slow down.
Minutes from the Fed’s November meeting signaled that the central bank is seeing progress in its fight against high inflation and is looking to slow the pace of rate hikes.
“A substantial majority of participants judged that a slowing in the pace of increase would likely soon be appropriate,” the minutes stated.
Stocks jumped on the news Wednesday, notching the second consecutive day of gains in a week marked by choppy trading and low volumes.
Markets were closed on Thursday for the Thanksgiving holiday and will close at 1 p.m. ET on Friday.
Source link: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/25/stock-market-futures-open-to-close-news.html