11.15am: Meta and Nike spike
US stocks have improved as Wednesday trading has continued, with strength in big tech and software offsetting another bout of profit-taking in semiconductors.
The Dow Jones is up 0.3% and the S&P 500 has gained 0.2%, while the Nasdaq is now flat.
Meta is the standout winner, jumping more than 11% after the Bloomberg report that it is exploring a cloud infrastructure business to offer customers access to AI models and computing power.
Palantir and AppLovin are both up around 9%-10%, while Coinbase has added more than 9%.
On the Dow, Salesforce is leading the gains, up more than 5%, with Nike rebounding 4.4% after yesterday's post-results sell-off.
Chip stocks remain under pressure, however, with investors continuing to take profits after the sector's huge second-quarter rally.
10am: Chips and hardware stocks lead Wall St lower at open
US stocks have opened lower, as expected, led by a 0.7% drop for the tech-heavy Nasdaq.
The S&P 500 has slid 0.3% in early trades, while the Dow Jones retreated just 0.1% from its record high.
Nasdaq 100 fallers were led by chip and hardware names,
Storage and memory stocks were a notable part of the retreat, with SanDisk down 8.1%, and Seagate over 6%, while Western Digital slid 5.5%.
Semiconductor equipment stocks were also weak, with KLA falling 8.1%, Applied Materials and Lam Research both off more than 7%.
Among the biggest names, Nvidia dropped 2.8%, Broadcom 1.8%, Micron fell 6.6% and AMD 4.7%.
Meta Platforms jumped 7% on a report that it is working on plans for a cloud infrastructure business that would sell outside customers access to AI models and computing power.
Bloomberg said the effort is centred on a new internal group called Meta Compute, putting the Facebook owner on a potential collision course with Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.
9.40am: Warsh speech
Just as markets are about to open, Fed chief Kevin Warsh has been speaking at the ECB conference in Portugal, where he has been keeping markets waiting for a clearer signal on rates, declining to give strong hints on whether the Fed could raise at its next meeting.
The new Fed chair doubled down on his views on reducing the amount of forward guidance that the central banks gives, saying it "is not the right policy for the current moment".
He said policymakers would wait for more data, while stressing that the central bank would stay focused on monetary policy and defend its independence in the fight against inflation.
He also said inflation risks and inflation expectations had eased in recent weeks, but did not give investors enough to push rate hike bets much lower.
The remarks leave this week’s US jobs data as the next major test for markets, with traders still pricing a meaningful chance of another move from the Fed.
Asked whether the market is in bubble territory, he says: “I'm not prepared to sort of make a broad comment denoting risks that are available in the system, but I will say this: this is the biggest time of consequence to each of our economies, I think in our lifetime.”
On productivity, he says: "If the last four quarters are an indication, there is reason to be optimistic."
8am: Wall Street stock futures in red
US stock futures are pointing lower on the first of July after Wall Street rounded off its best quarter since 2020, with investors exercising some caution before jobs data and a speech from new Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh.
Nasdaq futures were down 0.4%, while Dow Jones and S&P 500 futures were off 0.2%.
That follows a strong quarter-ending session overnight, where the Nasdaq jumped 1.5% to 26,213.7 points, the S&P 500 gained 0.8% to 7,499, and the Dow Jones rose 0.3% to a fresh high of 52,319.
The S&P returned 15.2% over the quarter, helped by a powerful rally in chip stocks.
Deutsche Bank strategists said the mood turned more cautious after strong US job openings data and hawkish comments from Cleveland Fed president Beth Hammack.
Hammack said the US may "need higher interest rates to bring inflation back down to target", lifting market pricing for a July rate rise.
According to the CME’s FedWatch Tool, the probability of at least one 25-basis point rate hike this year now stands at 83%, with a 50% chance of a rise as soon as September
Market analysts said Warsh’s speech at the Sintra conference in Portugal today would be crucial for sentiment at the start of the third quarter. Warsh speaks at 9am New York time.
In company news, Nike shares are 2.1% lower pre-market after its fourth-quarter sales fell 1%, underlying profit was flat, and guidance pointed to revenue falling by low- to mid-single digits over the next two quarters.