Major stock indices fall ahead of Fed Chair Powell's speech

Yahoo Finance Live’s Rachelle Akuffo joins the Live show to discuss how stocks are trading ahead of Fed Chair Powell’s speech on Tuesday.

Video transcript

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RACHELLE AKUFFO: Here's a look at what I'm watching this morning. Equities feeling the Monday blues as attention turns to a speech from Jay Powell, who takes stock at the halfway point for results season and asks the question, are we in an earnings recession? Well, from Amazon to Google, it seems like big tech wants a bigger and bigger piece of the health care pie. We'll speak with an expert on how science fiction is fast becoming science fact.

And splashing the cash, how much are we spending? And where is the money going? From travel to crypto, we speak with Visa's CFO this hour on the trends you need to know about. But first, let's take a look at how the major indices are faring an hour and a half into the trading day. Of course, awaiting word from Jay Powell, a bit of jitteriness here in the markets, but still off the session lows, the Dow there down about a 1/3 of a percent there, down 115 points.

Taking a look at the S&P 500 there, down more than half of a percent on the day, and the tech heavy NASDAQ also digesting earnings season. Of course, they're down 83 points on the day. Let's also check in on the Treasury market as any notes that we get from the Fed always reflected there. We're seeing all three in positive territory there. Look, the five year they're up almost 3 and 1/3 of a percent, the 10 year up 2 and 1/3 of A percent, and the third year, just shy of being 1% up.

Well of course, there's lots for investors to keep an eye on as we begin this new trading week. Now, here's some of the top things to keep watch on. So of course Fed Chair, Jay Powell is gearing up to speak at the Economic Club of Washington. That's happening tomorrow. Now, this comes days after January's blowout jobs report just as the employment picture began to show some signs of moderation. And investors will of course, be eager to hear Powell's remarks as investor optimism dims on a possible pause in rate hikes still possible.

And of course, staying in DC, President Biden prepares to give his State of the Union address, giving a glimpse of how he plans to push forward his legislative priorities amid a new Congress. And the speech also comes as Washington works on getting a handle on the debt ceiling with Us-China relations also likely to be topics of note. That's following the fallout from the downing of an alleged Chinese spy balloon.

And of course, on the earnings front, Disney gears up to report quarterly results this week. All eyes will be on Bob Iger, as this will be the first report since his return as Disney's CEO. Now, shares of the media giant have climbed roughly 25% so far this year. We'll see if the company will be able to keep this momentum, or if this week's earnings results will send shares tumbling as performance of parts and streaming would of course, be back in the spotlight.