Peter Nurse    

Investing.com — U.S. stocks are seen opening marginally higher Friday, continuing the previous session’s rebound as investors sought bargains after expectations of aggressive Federal Reserve interest rate increases had weighed.

The contract traded at 7:01 AM ET (1100 GMT) and was up 115 point, or 0.3%. It also traded 13 points higher, or 0.3%. And it climbed 40 percent, or 0.3%.

Thursday’s closing was up for the main Wall Street indexes. The blue chip rose nearly 100 points or 0.3% thanks to dip-buying investors who sought value following digesting tighter U.S. monetary policy.

The averages for this week are set to be lower, however, as the Dow is expected to drop 0.7% and then fall 1%. 

A report from March’s Federal Reserve meeting, which witnessed the U.S. central banking raise interest rates for only the second time since 2018. Recent comments by policymakers also indicated that hefty rate hikes were possible.

St. Louis Fed President “James Bullard doubled down on his recent hawkish statements by calling for up to 300bp of tightening this year,” said ING analysts, in a note.

Next week’s new quarterly earnings season begins with reports from the bank sector. JPMorgan (NYSE 🙂 will be reporting before the bell Wednesday. Citigroup (NYSE:), Goldman Sachs (NYSE:), Morgan Stanley (NYSE,) Wells Fargo (NYSE: ) reports before Thursday’s open.

Expect a decline in earnings by major lenders from the previous year. They were able to benefit from exceptional dealmaking and trading. Investors will focus on increased net income than the possibility of lower interest rates. 

The Friday schedule does not include any major economic data. Investors will instead be focused on Ukraine’s events following the reports of numerous deaths from a Russian rocket attack on an east Ukrainian railway station.

On Thursday, the U.S. Congress removed Russia from its “most-favored nation” status. This was in response to previous reports of Russian military atrocities on Ukrainian civilians.

Oil prices stabilized Friday but are still heading for hefty weekly losses, weighed by the decision of a number of major consuming nations to release massive amounts of crude from emergency reserves as well as China’s worsening demand outlook as its Covid outbreak persists. 

International Energy Agency members announced that this week, they would also release the – adding to the 180million barrels of oil released last week by the United States. On Thursday, China revealed over 21,000 Covid cases.

At 7AM ET futures had traded 0.1% higher to $96.09/barrel, an increase of 3.2%. Contracts fell 0.2% at $100.35, a drop of 3.9% this week.

The price fell 0.2% to $1.933.40/oz. However, it was 0.1% lower at 1.0884.