Investing.com – U.S. Futures were higher on Monday, indicating Wall Street is set to extend gains after strong jobs data last week.
The S&P 500 futures rose nine points or 0.34% to 2,798.25 as of 6:42 AM ET (10:42 GMT) while Dow futures increased 95 points or 0.37% to 25,455.0. Meanwhile tech heavy Nasdaq 100 futures was up 41 points or 0.58% to 7,165.25.
The economy added 313,000 jobs in February, which was more than expected, according to data released payrolls processor ADP on Friday. Hourly average earnings rose 0.1% month-on-month, below a forecast of 0.2%. The low earnings numbers eased investor concern about the possibility of rising inflation.
All three major indexed closed with gains of around 1.7% on Friday after the ‘Goldilocks’ jobs report.
Chinese small consumer credit firm Qudian Inc (NYSE:QD) was among the top gainers in pre-market trading, rising 6.96% after its earnings report came in higher than expected. Meanwhile semiconductor Micron Technology Inc (NASDAQ:MU) increased 2.84% whileAdvanced Micro Devices Inc (NASDAQ:AMD) was up 1.20% and financial services company E-TRADE Financial Corporation (NASDAQ:ETFC) gained 1.19%.
Elsewhere Teva Pharma Industries Ltd ADR (NYSE:TEVA) was down 0.63% while pharmaceuticals firm Savara Inc (NASDAQ:SVRA) dslumped 23.04%.
In political news, U.S. President Donald Trump is considering Christopher Liddell to succeed departing top economic adviser, Gary Cohn. Liddell, a former executive at Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and General Motors (NYSE:GM), is the White House’s director of strategic initiatives.
In Europe stocks were up. Germany’s DAX rose 97 points or 0.79% while in France the CAC 40 increased 16 points or 0.31% and in London, the FTSE 100 was up two points or 0.03%. Meanwhile the pan-European Euro Stoxx 50 gained 23 points or 0.68% while Spain’s IBEX 35 rallied 49 points or 0.52%.
In commodities, gold futures were down 0.54% to $1,316.90 a troy ounce while crude oil futures fell 0.45% to $61.76 a barrel. The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, inched down 0.03% to 90.08.