US pre-open: Stocks seen flat ahead of payrolls

(Sharecast News) - US futures pointed to a steady open on Wall Street on Friday as investors eyed the latest US non-farm payrolls report. At 1040 BST, Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 futures were flat, while Nasdaq futures were 0.1% firmer.

Sophie Lund-Yates, lead equity analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "One data set the market has its eyes firmly trained on is US jobs data. The US is expected to report the economy added 185,000 jobs in May, which marks an increase from April. Unemployment is due to hold steady at two year highs. Ultimately, these numbers are due to show the US continues to have a strong labour market, even if conditions are cooling slightly.

"The Federal Reserve will of course take these figures into account, but barring anything wilding off-course, the figures are unlikely to shake policymakers off the course already charted. Optimism remains in the market that two cuts could be on the way this year."

Investors will also be mulling the latest data out of China, which showed the trade surplus expanded to a three-month high in May as exports rose more than expected.

The trade balance was $82.62bn last month in USD terms, up from $72.35bn in April, according to the General Administration of Customs of the People's Republic of China.

This was well ahead of the $73bn consensus forecast and the biggest trade surplus since February.

Annual export growth picked up to a four-month high of 7.6%, up from 1.5% in April and beating the 6.0% estimate.

Import growth however eased to just 1.8% from 8.4% and well below the 4.2% increase expected by economists.

In corporate news, DocuSign looked set for heavy losses after the e-signature firm's second-quarter guidance on billings left investors disappointed.

Braze surged, however, as the cloud-based software company lifted its full-year revenue outlook.