US STOCKS-Wall St set to fall at open on inflation concerns, rising yields

  • Reuters
  • Stock Market News
US STOCKS-Wall St set to fall at open on inflation concerns, rising yields
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* Technology-related companies resume slide

* Boeing (NYSE: BA ) falls on 777 engine problem

* Discovery (JO: DSBPp ) rises on strong paid streaming subscribers forecast

* Futures down: Dow 0.53%, S&P 0.68%, Nasdaq 1.19%

(Adds comments, bullets, background; updates prices throughout)

By Devik Jain and Shreyashi Sanyal

Feb 22 (Reuters) - U.S. stock indexes were on track to open lower on Monday as climbing Treasury yields and prospects of rising inflation triggered valuation concerns, hitting shares of technology-related companies.

Shares of Apple Inc AAPL.O , Microsoft Corp MSFT.O , Facebook Inc FB.O , Alphabet Inc GOOGL.O , Tesla Inc TSLA.O , Netflix Inc NFLX.O and Amazon.com Inc AMZN.O resumed their declines from the previous week, falling between 1% and 2.8% in trading before the bell.

A largely upbeat fourth-quarter earnings had powered Wall Street's main indexes to record highs earlier last week, but the rally lost steam on fears of a potential snag in countrywide inoculation efforts and inflation concerns rising from a raft of stimulus measures.

"Since investors are anticipators, they are preparing for a potential spike in inflation now," said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.

"Most growth stocks benefit from declining interest rates. If interest rates are expected to rise, then that would reduce the intrinsic value of growth stocks."

Yields on 10-year Treasury notes have already reached 1.38% US10YT=RR , above the psychological 1.30% level. MKTS/GLOB

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell in his semi-annual testimony before Congress this week is likely to reiterate a commitment to keeping policy super easy for as long as needed to drive inflation higher. stocks have benefited recently from a rotation out of technology-related shares on hopes that they stand to gain from pent-up demand once the coronavirus pandemic is subdued.

The S&P 500 value index .IVX has posted three straight weeks of gains this month, while the S&P 500 growth index .IGX lost 1.7% last week.

The Dow .DJI closed almost flat for the week on Friday, while the benchmark S&P 500 .SPX and the tech-heavy Nasdaq .IXIC posted their first weekly declines this month.

At 8:37 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis 1YMcv1 were down 168 points, or 0.53%, S&P 500 e-minis EScv1 were down 26.5 points, or 0.68%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis NQcv1 were down 161.25 points, or 1.19%.

Boeing Co BA.N dropped 2.9% after a United Airlines UAL.O plane's engine shed debris over Denver on Saturday, prompting the planemaker to urge airlines to suspend the use of its 777 jets with Pratt & Whitney 4000 engines. Technologies Corp RTX.N , owner of Pratt & Whitney, also fell 1.9%.

Discovery Inc DISCA.O gained 4.4% after the media company said it was expecting to have 12 million global paid streaming subscribers by the end of February, as coronavirus-led restrictions kept people home. Corp KSS.N jumped 9.3% after a group of activist investors, nominated nine directors to the troubled department store chain's board. Financial Group Inc PFG.O gained 5.1% after a media report that activist investor Elliott Management Corp had taken a stake in the life insurance company and planned to push for changes.

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