A day after the Fed's first rate hike in three years, the mood has flipped: US futures point higher as Treasury yields back off multi-decade highs and oil extends a sharp slide, letting beaten-up chip stocks lead a broad pre-open bounce.

Futures now

Trading Economics reports S&P 500, Nasdaq 100 and Dow contracts all around 1% higher, erasing two sessions of losses; index ETF proxies were up 1.16%–1.60% against Wednesday's close (StockAnalysis.com). The driver is the bond market. The FOMC raised the fed funds target 25bp to 3.75%–4.00% in a unanimous vote — its first hike since July 2023 — and Chair Kevin Warsh reaffirmed the inflation fight without triggering a fresh yield spike.

Pre-market movers

Semis are doing the heavy lifting after this week's AI-capex scare (StockAnalysis.com, ~9:12 AM ET):

• Marvell +4.85%, Lam Research +4.23%, Seagate +4.19%, AMD +4.06%, Intel +3.61%, Broadcom +2.47%, Nvidia +2.15%.
• Hyperscalers follow: Amazon +2.10%, Alphabet +1.41%, Microsoft +0.92%; Tesla +2.06%.
• Generac +33% to ~$233.50 — Investing.com reports a deal to supply backup generators for Amazon's data centres: $2.4bn of initial deliveries in 2027–28, up to $8bn over its life, plus a warrant for Amazon over ~1.69m shares at ~$200.93.
• Fluence Energy −23% on a guidance cut and analyst downgrades.

More at marketchacha.com/movers.

Earnings & IPOs

A thin corporate day: Thursday's reporters are small caps (Rezolute, US Gold, Bridgford), with no S&P 500 name after the close. Yesterday's print was Lennar — Q3 net earnings $284m ($1.19/sh) versus $591m a year ago, new orders −9% to 20,879 homes, homebuilding gross margin 15.8% from 17.5%, FY26 deliveries guided down to 80,000–81,000. Holtec Nuclear (HNUC) and Orion180 Insurance (OIG) are slated to list tomorrow.

Macro today

The 8:30 ET block is already out (Trading Economics):

• Initial jobless claims 196K (week to Sep 12), −10K and well under the ~208K consensus, the lowest since July. Continuing claims 1.730m, the lowest since January 2024.
• Philadelphia Fed manufacturing 37.8 in September, down from 47.4 but far above the ~30.5 consensus; both price gauges rose again.
• Housing starts 1.275m in August, −2.6% m/m, below the ~1.31m forecast; building permits 1.394m, −2.7% m/m, under ~1.41m.

Still due: pending home sales (10:00 ET), EIA natural gas stocks (10:30 ET), the weekly 30-year mortgage rate, a 10-year TIPS auction and bill auctions, and the Fed balance sheet after the close. No Fed speakers scheduled. A tight labour market plus hot Philly Fed prices-paid is the mix that keeps a second 2026 hike live; soft housing is the counterweight. Full calendar.

Rates, dollar & commodities

Per Trading Economics: US 10-year 4.95%, about 7bp lower and back below the 5.04% touched earlier this week (highest since 2007); 2-year 4.68%, 30-year 5.31%. DXY 100.08 (−0.17%), near seven-week highs. Brent $102.31 (−3.33%), WTI $100.26 (−2.12%) after Saudi Arabia signalled progress restoring flows through its East-West pipeline. Gold $4,363/oz (+2.33%).

Overnight global

Asia took the hike well: the Nikkei 225 closed +0.33% at 64,136 and the Topix +0.8% on a weaker yen and cheaper crude, while the Shanghai Composite slipped 0.41% to 3,875.6 before US–China talks ahead of the September 24 Trump–Xi summit. In Europe, the DAX is up ~0.7% above 25,700, the CAC 40 +0.4% at 8,172, and the FTSE 100 +0.5% near 10,750 after the Bank of England held with three MPC members voting to hike.

What to watch at the open

The question is whether the 10-year holds below 5% — that, more than anything, is what has let long-duration tech bid this morning. Watch whether the semiconductor bounce survives the cash session or fades as it did earlier this week, and whether Generac's Amazon contract re-rates the wider data-centre power complex or stays a single-stock story. Housing remains the soft spot against a Fed that has just said it is not finished.

As of 9:18 AM ET. Sources: Trading Economics, StockAnalysis.com, Investing.com, InvestingLive, StockTitan. Figures as reported by those sources. Automated US market brief for discussion and education only — not investment advice. Verify before acting.