US futures tread water with Dow poised for another bid for 40,000

US stocks trod water on Friday as they regrouped for another bid to take out milestones as investors dithered over the odds for rate cuts.

Dow Jones Industrial Average futures (YM=F) held steady on the heels of touching the key 40,000 level for the first time in Thursday’s trading. Futures on the S&P 500 (ES=F) and the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 (NQ=F) were also little changed, with all the gauges on track for weekly wins.

The run-up in stocks hit a bump in the wake of comments from Fed officials warning that rates are likely to stay at historic highs for a while. That dampened enthusiasm for the likelihood of a September cut that had been lifted by encouraging inflation data.

Read more: How does the labor market affect inflation?

Friday’s light economic and corporate calendar leaves few jumping-off points for the Dow to make another bid at crossing its key milestone, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq have their own fresh records within reach.

That puts the spotlight on appearances by the Fed’s Mary Daly and Christopher Waller on Friday. The market will listen for any deviation from their colleagues’ message that the Fed will follow the data and wait for clear signs of cooling inflation before making a move.

In individual movers, Reddit (RDDT) shares jumped as much as 14% in pre-market trading, not far off its highest close of $65.11 hit in March. The social media platform has signed a partnership with OpenAI that will see ChatGPT integrate content from its forums.

Meanwhile, GameStop (GME) shares fell after the games retailer said it expects first-quarter sales to drop as shoppers shift to online outlets. Shares in the meme stock soared at the start of the week in an echo of the 2021 frenzy, but the rally has turned into a slide in recent days.