Stock Futures, Treasurys Steady as Markets Take Breather — Update

By Joe Stonor

Stock futures steadied and Treasurys weakened slightly in muted trading, as markets calmed after a volatile day on Thursday.

Nasdaq futures were flat after the index flipped sharp intraday losses Thursday to end the last session higher.

Artificial-intelligence stocks remained fragile as chip makers slipped in premarket trade. Cloud-computing provider CoreWeave, whose soaring borrowing costs were one force behind investors' latest flight out of AI, traded down 2.5% premarket. If the Philadelphia semiconductor index falls Friday, it will notch its eighth-straight falling day--its longest such run since October 2008.

Futures for the S&P 500 rose 0.15%, while Dow Jones Industrial Average futures gained 0.2%. The cautious move back to risk followed a limited recovery in Asia, where the tech-heavy Kospi closed 2.05% higher in South Korea after falling 7.6% in the previous session. The index closed the week down 14.5%. Japan's Nikkei Stock Average gained 1.8%, while Taiwan's Taiex added 0.55%. European stock indexes were mixed, but AI-linked stocks on the continent largely strengthened, helping the Stoxx 600 rise 0.5%.

Treasurys held on to gains in the last session. Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh was equivocal during a moderated conversation at the annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund in Bangkok on Friday. Warsh said he doesn't "prejudge meetings" as he declined to endorse comments from fellow policymakers signaling the Fed is in no rush to raise rates later this month.

"The most important thing was what [Warsh] didn't say," Deutsche Bank's Jim Reid said. "Markets took the lack of hawkishness as good news."

Ten-year Treasury yields nudged 2.3 basis points higher to trade around 5.110%, while 30-year yields also rose, hovering around 5.450%. At the short end, two-year yields were little moved at around 4.760%.

Brent crude oil prices reversed earlier losses to rise 0.3% around at $106.30 a barrel. Traders weighed plans from the International Energy Agency to accelerate the release of around 100 million barrels of oil against the continued risk to Mideast oil supply amid intensifying Houthi militant attacks on Saudi Arabia.

The dollar fell against a basket of global currencies, while bitcoin gained 0.8% to trade around $82,700. New York gold futures rose back above $4,200 a troy ounce.

Data releases due Friday include U.S. industrial production and capacity utilization for September.

Write to Joe Stonor at josephmichael.stonor@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 16, 2026 08:15 ET (12:15 GMT)