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Meta climbs on report of more layoffs
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Fidelity National slumps on payments business spinoff
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Novavax rises on report of U.S. government vaccine deal
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Futures: Nasdaq up 0.33%, S&P up 0.09%, Dow flat
(Adds comment; updates prices, details)
By Johann M Cherian
Feb 13 (Reuters) - The Nasdaq index was set to open
higher on Monday as beaten-down megacap growth stocks gained,
while Meta Platforms climbed on reports of fresh layoffs.
Apple Inc , Amazon.com Inc , Alphabet Inc , Tesla Inc and Microsoft Corp added
between 0.1% and 1.1% before the bell.
"(Investors) have been holding back during the regime of
rate hikes because they believed it would kill the growth of
technology type stocks," said Peter Andersen, founder of
Andersen Capital Management.
Andersen added that the Fed is now signaling that its near
the end of its tightening cycle, which could provide an added
boost to such high-growth firms.
All U.S. indexes clocked their worst declines last year
since the financial crisis of 2008, led by a 33% slump in the
tech-heavy Nasdaq , on fears that the Federal Reserve
would tip the economy into a recession with its hawkish monetary
policy.
While money markets are expecting rates to peak at 5.2% in
July, a resilient labor market has lifted hopes of a
milder-than-expected recession. Meanwhile, Meta rose 2.2% on reports over the
weekend that the Facebook parent is preparing to announce a
fresh round of job cuts.
At 8:49 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were down 14 points,
or 0.04%, S&P 500 e-minis were up 3.5 points, or 0.09%,
and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 40.5 points, or 0.33%.
Defense firms such as Boeing Co , Raytheon
Technologies Corp , Lockheed Martin Corp and
L3harris Technologies Inc added between 0.2% and 0.8%.
Novavax Inc added 1.8% after the U.S. government
agreed to buy 1.5 million more doses of its COVID-19 vaccine.
Fidelity National Information Services Inc plunged
14.6% following its decision to spin off its merchant payments
business.
Markets now await January inflation on Tuesday and retail
sales data later in the week to reassess their bets on the
central bank's monetary policy path.
(Reporting by Johann M Cherian in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju
Samuel and Sriraj Kalluvila)
