By Peter Nurse
Investing.com -- U.S. stocks are seen opening marginally lower Thursday, as the conflict in Ukraine intensifies and investors await the release of weekly jobless data.
Fed chief Jerome Powell will also testify for a second day on Capitol Hill after telling a House finance panel on Wednesday that he supported a 25 basis-point rate hike later this month. That soothed investors who had feared an even larger rate increase to combat inflation as the Ukraine conflict sends commodity prices soaring.
At 7 AM ET (1200 GMT), the Dow Futures contract was down 50 points, or 0.1%, S&P 500 Futures traded 10 points, or 0.2%, lower and Nasdaq 100 Futures dropped 45 points, or 0.3%.
The main Wall Street indices closed higher Wednesday, with the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average gaining almost 600 points, or 1.8%, the broad-based S&P 500 rising 1.9% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite ending up 1.6%.
However, despite Wednesday’s advance, all three major averages are down more than 4% over the last month, with the bulk of losses concentrated over the last week and the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The conflict has intensified, with Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, suffering heavy artillery and rocket bombardment, while a miles-long military convoy of troops nears Kyiv, the capital. Russian forces have also captured the Black Sea port of Kherson.
Also on the agenda Thursday is the weekly jobless claims report, due at 8:30 AM ET. This comes a day after the ADP private payroll report for February showed companies hired more workers than expected, an indication the economy is on good footing.
In corporate news, Snowflake (NYSE:SNOW) will be in the spotlight after the cloud data warehousing company reported its slowest revenue growth since 2019 in the fourth quarter.
Splunk (NASDAQ:SPLK) will also be in focus after the software company surprised with an adjusted profit as well as a forecast for stronger revenue growth than last year. It also named Proofpoint (NASDAQ:PFPT) founder Gary Steele as its new CEO.
Earnings are due from the likes of retail store Costco (NASDAQ:COST) and semiconductor Broadcom (NASDAQ:AVGO) after the close.
Oil prices soared to new multi-year highs after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and their allies, known as OPEC+, decided to stick with a planned increase in output of 400,000 barrels per day in March, largely ignoring the Ukraine crisis and the associated surge in prices during their talks.
Wednesday's crude oil supply data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration showed a reduction of just over 2.5 million barrels last week, with stocks at the key Cushing, Oklahoma crude hub at their lowest since 2018.
By 7 AM ET, U.S. crude futures traded 1.8% higher at $112.64 a barrel, after earlier hitting $116.50, an 11-year high, while the Brent contract rose 1.6% to $114.73, having earlier traded above $118, a level last seen in February 2013.
Additionally, gold futures rose 0.7% to $1,935.10/oz, while EUR/USD traded 0.3% lower at 1.1087.