Below are the most important news, trends and analyzes that investors need to start their trading day:
1. Dow futures rebound after the biggest loss in a February
The Wall Street sign is seen outside the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York on February 16, 2021.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
US futures rose on Friday after the Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and Nasdaq suffered their biggest one-day losses during the heat of February. The Dow, which broke a three-day winning streak and fell from the record high, remained on track for a positive week, which would be its third in a row. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq are losing three-day losing streak and are going at the pace of their first losing weeks in the last three.
Bitcoin, which topped $ 52,000 this week, hit another all-time high early Friday at about $ 53,000 per unit. After Tesla and other companies recently showed support for the world’s largest cryptocurrency, major financial companies also appeared to be heating it up. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told CNBC on Thursday that she considers Bitcoin to be a “highly speculative asset.”
2. Treasury Secretary Yellen is pushing for a major Covid stimulus
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen speaks during a virtual roundtable with participants from local Black Chambers of Commerce on February 5, 2021 in Washington, DC.
Drew Angerer | Getty Images
As the House intends to approve the $ 1.9 trillion version of President Joe Biden’s coronavirus relief plan by the end of next week, Yellen told CNBC that a large package of incentives is needed to recover the economy. “The price of doing too little is much higher than doing something big,” he said. “We believe the benefits will far outweigh the costs in the long run.” Democrats hope to get their bill to Congress before March 14, when major federal unemployment benefit programs expire.
3. Biden will pledge billions in global aid to vaccination against Covid
President Joe Biden speaks during a meeting with labor leaders on coronavirus relief in the Oval Office on Wednesday, February 17, 2021.
Pete Marovich | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Biden is expected to announce on Friday that the United States will spend $ 4 billion on international vaccination efforts against Covid. He will make the promise during his first virtual meeting as president with G-7 leaders. Biden will also urge other nations to allocate more money to the global fight against the pandemic.
Later, Biden travels to Michigan to visit Pfizer’s vaccine manufacturing plant in Kalamazoo, a trip that was supposed to happen on Thursday but was postponed due to the winter weather. Biden made his first national trip as president Tuesday, traveling to Wisconsin to look for a CNN town hall on the coronavirus.
4. Uber has been dealt a major blow as major UK courts rule that drivers are workers
A driver uses the Uber app to drop off a passenger in London.
Chris J. Ratcliffe | Bloomberg via Getty Images
Uber shares fell 3% in the pre-market after the UK Supreme Court ruled on Friday that the company’s drivers should be classified as workers rather than independent contractors. The ruling puts an end to a nearly five-year legal battle between Uber and a group of former drivers in Britain. Uber insists its drivers work on their own and act as an “agency” that connects them to passengers through an app. The company faced a challenge in the California domestic market in November, when voters backed a voting proposal that consolidated application-based food delivery and the status of self-employed drivers, not employees.
5. Citadel’s Ken Griffin defends Wall Street’s controversial practice
Ken Griffin, founder and CEO of Citadel
Mike Blake | Reuters
During GameStop’s Thursday hearing at Capitol Hill, Citadel’s Ken Griffin championed a controversial method used by brokers to make money and said his company would adapt if new regulations prohibited the practice. Members of Congress spent much of their time wondering about “order flow payment,” a practice in which a broker receives payment from a manufacturer in markets like Citadel to direct the order to them. This model is how Robinhood and other brokers can offer trading without commissions. “I think paying for order flow has been a major source of innovation in the industry,” Griffin said.
– Reuters contributed to this report. Follow all developments on Wall Street in real time with the CNBC Pro Live Marketing Blog. Get the news about the pandemic with our coronavirus block.