Stock Futures Fall Despite Upbeat Inflation, Jobs Data

Stock futures are lower Thursday, extending yesterday's slide as traders unpack a key inflation reading and more jobs data. The personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index -- the Federal Reserve's favorite inflation gauge -- showed the 12-month inflation rate at 2.1%, in line with economists' estimates. Fed officials are targeting a 2% annual rate, which has not been done since February 2021. 

Meanwhile, jobless claims are down to a five-month low. The Labor Department saw initial jobless claims fall to 216,000 last week, beating out Wall Street's expectations of a rise to 230,000 as the distortion from the recent barrage of Hurricanes faded. Investors are also unpacking Big Tech earnings, with shares of Microsoft (MSFT) and Meta Platforms (META) moving lower after their reports.

Continue reading for more on today's market, including: 

• Schaeffer's Senior V.P of Research Todd Salamone analyzes the risk for bulls after the SPX's pullback.
• Unpacking Caesar Entertainment's surprising third-quarter results.
• Plus, Uber's third-quarter bookings disappoint; Estee Lauder withdraws guidance; and ARM dinged by downgrade.

5 Things You Need to Know Today

1. The Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE) saw more than 2 million call contracts and 1.2 million put contracts exchanged on Wednesday. The single-session equity put/call ratio rose to 0.63 and the 21-day moving average fell to 0.62.
2. Uber Technologies Inc (NYSE:UBER) is 5.4% lower before the open, despite a mostly upbeat third quarter. The ride-sharing giant reported earnings and revenue that cleared analysts' estimates, but shares are falling after gross bookings rose less than expected. Coming into today, UBER is up 29% since the start of 2024.
3. Shares of Estee Lauder Companies Inc (NYSE:EL) are 20.7% lower in electronic trading, on track to add to a 20.4% year-to-date deficit after the cosmetics company withdrew its fiscal-year guidance. In doing so, the company cited slowing sales in China, specifically "particular difficulty in forecasting the timing of market stabilization and recovery in China and Asia travel retail," as well as naming a new chief executive.
4. Arm Holdings PLC - ADR (NASDAQ:ARM) is down 5% before the bell, after Bernstein downgraded shares to "market  perform" from "underperform" with a new $100 price target -- a 35% premium to last night's close. In its bull note, the analyst said that while the semiconductor company's artificial intelligence (AI) products are performing well, it might not be enough to offset weakness in other areas. ARM is up 213.3% over the last 12 months. 
5. Employment data and more earnings are due out this week.

Japan Keeps Interest Rate Unchanged 

Asian markets finished mostly lower on Thursday, after the Bank of Japan (BoJ) kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged at 0.25%. Elsewhere, China’s manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI) came in at 50.1, beating estimates of 49.9 and breaking into expansion territory for the first time since April. China’s Shanghai Composite was the region’s only gainer with a 0.4% pop, while Japan’s Nikkei dropped 0.5%, after retail sales grew by a much smaller-than-expected margin. The South Korean Kospi and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng shed 1.5% and 0.3%, respectively, the former weighed down by a lackluster post-earnings reaction from tech titan Samsung Electronics.  

European bourses are falling after preliminary data showed the euro zone’s inflation grew 0.4% in the fourth quarter, above expectations of a 0.2% rise. London’s FTSE 100 is down 0.7% at last glance, while the French CAC 40 drops 1%, and the German DAX loses 0.5%.