Before Market Opens: 9 things to know at 9 am on June 2, 2022

Wall Street's three major indexes closed lower on Wednesday as investors bet that the latest economic data would do nothing to push the Federal Reserve off track from its aggressive interest rate hiking cycle aimed at taming run-away inflation. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 176.89 points, or 0.54%, to 32,813.23, the S&P 500 lost 30.92 points, or 0.75%, to 4,101.23 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 86.93 points, or 0.72%, to 11,994.46.

Shares in Asia-Pacific declined in Thursday trade, with Australia’s April trade surplus coming in higher than expected. The Nikkei 225 in Japan shed 0.21% while the Topix index fell 0.58%. South Korea’s Kospi dipped 0.97%. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan traded 0.98% lower.

Indian equity benchmarks finished a volatile session in the red on Wednesday, dragged by IT and FMCG shares though gains in financial shares limited the downside. The Sensex fell 185.2 points or 0.3 percent to end at 55,381.2 and the Nifty50 settled at 16,522.8, down 61.8 points or 0.4 percent from its previous close

At 8:20 am, the SGX Nifty was trading 105 points or 0.6 percent lower at 16,424, indicating a weak opening for the Indian markets.

Oil prices fell by around $3 a barrel in early Asian trade on Thursday as investors cashed in on a recent rally with a key producers meeting later in the day set to pave the way for expected output increases. Brent crude was down $2.76, or 2.4%, at $113.53 a barrel at 0024 GMT, having risen 0.6% the previous day. US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude dropped $2.89, or 2.9%, to $112.37 a barrel, after a 0.5% rise on Wednesday.

US job openings fell in April, but still remained at considerably high levels, suggesting that wages would continue to rise as companies try to attract workers, and contribute to inflation staying uncomfortably high for a while. Job openings, a measure of labour demand, declined by 455,000 to 11.4 million on the last day of April, the Labor Department said in its monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, or JOLTS report, on Wednesday. The decrease pulled job openings down from a record high of 11.855 million in March.

The rupee recovered from its record low to close 21 paise higher at 77.50 against the American currency on Wednesday.

Gold held its ground on Thursday, supported by lower US Treasury yields, after mounting concerns over stubborn inflation worldwide helped prices rebound from their lowest level in two weeks in the previous session. Spot gold was steady at $1,847.49 per ounce, as of 6:06 am

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) have net sold ₹1,930.16 crore worth of shares, whereas domestic institutional investors (DIIs) remained net buyers to the tune of ₹984.11 crore worth of shares on June 1, as per provisional data available on the NSE.