Here is what you need to know.
Janet Yellen speaks. Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen is set to give her economic outlook at the Executives Club of Chicago at 1 p.m. ET. Traders will be listening for clues as to whether the Fed will hike interest rates at the conclusion of its March 14-15 meeting. World Interest Rate Probability data provided by Bloomberg says there’s an 88% chance the Fed hikes by 25 basis points at the meeting.
Europe is growing at its fastest pace since 2011. Markit’s final February composite reading for the eurozone came in at 56, well ahead of the 54.4 print from January. “Growth of eurozone economic output accelerated to a near six-year record in February,” IHS Markit said in a release.
Global manufacturing is making a comeback. Global manufacturers posted their best month in almost six years in February as the JPMorgan-IHS Markit Global Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index rose by 0.2 points to 52.9, making for the best reading in 69 months.
The dominant part of the UK economy is slowing down. UK services PMI slowed to 53.3 in February, missing the 54.2 that economists were expecting. “The slowdown mainly reflected a softer pace of new business growth, which some respondents linked to more cautious spending among consumers,” a release from Markit that accompanied the report said.
Bitcoin is extending its lead over gold. On Thursday, bitcoin climbed above gold for the first time. On Friday, the cryptocurrency trades up 2% at $1,281 a coin while the precious metal is down 0.5% at $1,228 an ounce.
Snap Inc. had a monster debut. Shares of the social-media company shot up 44% in their market debut to close at $24.48 a share, giving Snapchat's parent company a market cap of more than $33 billion. Snap is now bigger than Macy's ($10 billion), Twitter ($11.3 billion), American Airlines ($23.6 billion), and Target ($32.9 billion).
Costco same-store sales miss. The warehouse club retailer reported that same-store sales rose by 3% in its second quarter, missing the 3.2% gain that analysts were forecasting. The company also announced that it planned to raise membership fees as of June 1.
Stock markets around the world are mostly lower. Hong Kong's Hang Seng (-0.7%) trailed in Asia, and Germany's DAX (-0.2%) lags in Europe. The S&P 500 is set to open down 0.1% near 2,380.
Earnings reporting slows. Big Lots and Revlon will release their quarterly results ahead of the opening bell.
US economic data is light. Markit services PMI and ISM Non-Manufacturing will be released at 9:45 a.m. and 10 a.m. ET. The US 10-year yield is higher by 2 basis points at 2.50%.