Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on February 09, 2026 in New York City.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images
Stock futures inched higher on Wednesday as traders looked ahead to the release of the delayed January jobs report.
S&P 500 futures rose 0.1% while Nasdaq 100 futures gained 0.2%. Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 59 points, or 0.1%.
Traders are looking ahead to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ release of the January nonfarm payrolls report due Wednesday morning. The data had been delayed due to a partial government shutdown that ended on Feb. 3.
Economists expect that the latest jobs report will show little to no growth in January. The Dow Jones consensus is calling for a gain of 55,000, compared to a December increase of 50,000. Economists also see the unemployment rate landing at 4.4%. In addition, traders will be on the lookout for a batch of revisions from the BLS, which could shed some light on the state of the U.S. jobs market and economy.
“It’s been hard to get a read of exactly where the labor data is going to come out through the adjustments following out of the shutdown along with the basic uncertainty around the economy,” Krishna Guha, head of economics and central bank strategy at Evercore ISI told CNBC’s “Money Movers” on Tuesday.
“There seems to be a weaker relationship right now between growth and employment…part of that is the uncertainty and part of that, we think, may also be some secular AI-related effects on the labor market,” he added.
A lackluster jobs report would add to negative sentiment in the market that was driven by weaker-than-expected consumer data released on Tuesday. A new report showed that consumer spending in December was flat, missing the 0.4% monthly gain expected from economists polled by Dow Jones.
In the regular trading session, the S&P 500 slipped 0.3% as worries over artificial intelligence’s impact on the financial sector weighed on the index. After tech platform Altruist launched a new AI-powered tax planning tool, several financial services firms’ stocks fell. The Nasdaq Composite lost about 0.6%. However, the 30-stock Dow eked out a gain of 0.1%, notching another all-time high and a closing record.
Beyond the jobs report, other economic data that could steer markets will be released this week. The consumer price index, a key economic indicator that acts as a gauge for inflation, is expected to come out on Friday.
