Omicron fears linger
U.S. stock markets look set for a muted open on Wednesday, a day after the widely-followed S&P 500 dropped from its all-time high as Wall Street weighed worries over the growing Covid-19 infections around the world.
According to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, the U.S. is experiencing a surge in Covid-19 infections with more than 4.1 million cases reported this month.
Data released by the World Health Organization on Tuesday, also revealed that the number of new Covid-19 cases in Europe and Americas regions last week jumped by 57% and 30%, respectively.
As of 5:20 a.m. ET, the blue-chip Dow futures rose 46 points, or 0.13% to 36,328. S&P 500 futures added 9 points, or 0.19% to 4,787.5 while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures gained 57.25 points, or 0.35% to 16,545.25.
On Tuesday, the Dow climbed 95.83 points, or 0.26% to close at 36,398.21. The Nasdaq Composite gave away 89.54 points, or 0.56% to 15,781.72 while the S&P 500 shed 4.84 points, or 0.10% to end at 4,786.35.
Musk completes stock sales related to his options set to expire next year
Meanwhile, Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) chief executive Elon Musk has exercised all of his options expiring next year, according to financial filings published late Tuesday.
Musk converted 1.6 million options set to expire in August 2022 into stock and offloaded more than 934,000 shares for $1.02 billion to cover associated taxes. The move signals an end to his stock sales that recently triggered a slide in the price of Tesla shares.
Last week, Musk said that he would hit his target of selling nearly 10% of his shares in the electric-car company “when the 10b preprogrammed sales complete.”
Tesla stock was up $15.41, or 1.42% to $1,103.88 a share in the premarket trading session on Wednesday.
Biden reportedly considering Raskin for top Fed banking regulator job
In other news, a new report from the Wall Street Journal says that President Biden is looking at naming former Federal Reserve governor to the central bank’s vice chair of supervision.
Citing people familiar with the matter, the report said Biden is also considering appointing Philip Jefferson, an administrator and professor at Davidson College in North Carolina, and Lisa Cook, a professor at Michigan State University, to fill two other Fed board seats that will soon be vacant.
The President’s choice of Raskin, who also served as a Treasury Department official in the Obama administration, may calm Democrat progressives who consider Fed Chair Jerome Powell not tough enough on large financial firms.
Senator Elizabeth Warren, a long-time critic of Powell, has previously indicated that she would support either Raskin or former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Richard Cordray to serve as Fed’s vice chair of supervision.
