Stock Futures Point Higher to Begin Week; Gold Approaches All-Time Record

Stock futures pointed sharply higher and gold neared its all-time record to begin the last full trading week of the year.

Futures associated with the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average, benchmark S&P 500, and tech-heavy Nasdaq all were up roughly 0.5%.

On Friday, the three major stock indexes fell as technology shares remained under pressure on AI bubble fears. The Nasdaq sank 1.7%; the S&P 500, which like the Dow set an all-time closing high Thursday, fell 1.1%; and the Dow set an intraday record high for a second straight session soon after markets opened but reversed course and ended down 0.5%.

Shares of Oracle (ORCL), which lost about 15% of their value over the final two trading days last week after the cloud computing giant reported disappointing earnings, ticked higher in premarket trading. Those of chip designer Broadcom (AVGO), which traded at a record high as recently as Wednesday, rebounded about 1% after plunging 11% Friday following its own quarterly report.

Chip stocks Nvidia (NVDA), Micron Technology (MU), and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) also rebounded modestly before the bell after posting sharp losses to end last week.

Gold futures were up 1% to $4,370 an ounce in recent trading. They had hit nearly $4,385 earlier in the session to approach their all-time high of $4,398 set on Oct. 20.

The 10-year Treasury yield, which influences interest rates on a variety of commercial and consumer loans, slipped to 4.17% from 4.19% at Friday’s close. The yield hit a three-month high of 4.21% on Wednesday before the Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate for a third consecutive meeting.

Bitcoin traded around $89,800, up from the day’s low of $87,600. The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the value of the greenback against a basket of foreign currencies, ticked down to 98.31, slightly below its lowest closing level since mid-October, 98.35, set last Thursday.

West Texas Intermediate futures, the U.S. crude oil benchmark, slipped 0.2% 5o $57.35 a barrel.