LDN - Business

Futures flat as Yellen's speech awaited

[September 26, 2017] By Sruthi Shankar

(Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures were little changed on Tuesday, with investors looking for more clarity on interest rate hikes from Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen.

* Yellen will be speaking on "Inflation, Uncertainty, and Monetary Policy" at an annual meeting of National Association for Business Economics at 12:45 p.m. ET.

* Yellen's speech comes a day after a host of Fed officials provided differing views on inflation, with one central banker saying inflation weakness is fading, while another suggesting he's nervous it won't.

* Cleveland Fed Chief Loretta Mester, her Atlanta counterpart, Raphael Bostic, and Fed's Board Governor Lael Brainard are also scheduled to speak.

* Wall Street ended lower on Monday as a selloff in technology shares weighed down the Nasdaq and North Korea's threats kept investors on edge.

* North Korea appears to have boosted defenses on its east coast, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported, after Pyongyang said President Donald Trump had declared war and that it would shoot down U.S. bombers flying near the peninsula.

* Technology stocks were slightly higher premarket, following a selloff the day before on increasing worries that the top-performing sector is falling out of favor.

* Economic data includes a report on new U.S. single-family home sales, which is likely to show it increased to 0.588 million in August after unexpectedly falling in July. The report is expected at 10:00 a.m. ET.

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A trader works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., September 21, 2017. REUTERS/Brendan Mcdermid

* Also scheduled for release at 10:00 a.m. ET is a report on U.S. consumer confidence, which is expected to show it fell to 120 in September from 122.9 in August.

* Red Hat rose 4.05 percent in premarket trading after the Linux distributor's quarterly profit came in above estimates and the company raised its full-year forecast.

* Alibaba rose 1.63 percent after the Chinese e-commerce firm took control of logistics unit Cainiao and pledged to spend $15 billion over five years to build out a global logistics network.

Futures snapshot at 7:08 a.m. ET:

* Dow e-minis were down 10 points, or 0.04 percent, with 22,892 contracts changing hands.

* S&P 500 e-minis were down 2.5 points, or 0.1 percent, with 127,187 contracts traded.

* Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 5.5 points, or 0.09 percent, on volume of 29,784 contracts.

(Reporting by Sruthi Shankar in Bengaluru; Editing by Anil D'Silva)

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