Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York City, U.S., Dec. 10, 2025.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
Stock futures are little changed Wednesday night after the Federal Reserve’s latest interest cut sparked a boost in U.S. equity markets.
Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 40 points, or 0.1%. S&P futures slipped about 0.2%, while Nasdaq 100 futures fell nearly 3%.
In after-hours trading, Oracle shares tumbled 11% after the cloud infrastructure company posted disappointing quarterly revenue. Synopsys, which got a $2 billion investment from Nvidia earlier this month, jumped nearly 3% in the after-hours session on the back of the company’s strong fourth-quarter results.
Stocks rose on Wednesday and got a lift after a divided Fed announced an interest rate cut for the third time this year and ruled out a rate hike. The central bank’s Federal Open Market Committee cut its key overnight borrowing rate by a quarter percentage point to a 3.5%-3.75% range and signaled a slower pace of rate cuts ahead.
Fed chair Jerome Powell said the central bank is “‘well positioned to wait and see how the economy evolves” and noted President Donald Trump’s tariffs have been a driver of inflation.
The three major indexes closed in the green, with the 30-stock Dow jumping about 497 points, or nearly 1.1%. The Russell 2000 index of small-capitalization stocks notched a record close. Smaller companies tend to benefit more from lower rates than larger companies because their borrowing costs are more closely linked to market rates.
Although markets rallied toward the latter half of Wednesday’s session, some investors suggest being cautious ahead given that the central bank remains in a wait-and-see mode over the path of future monetary policy.
“We’re not surprised to see near term optimism in the markets given that the Fed continues to cut rates even though the economy is growing, however, we think the rose colored glasses may come off once investors realize that the path to lower interest rates may take longer — or may not materialize at all — to the extent that they believe it will,” said Chris Zaccarelli, chief investment officer for Northlight Asset Management.
F.L.Putnam Investment Management chief market strategist Ellen Hazen said that greater uncertainty regarding future interest rates and conflicting data around the state of the U.S. economy could “lead to higher volatility and risk premia across risk markets like equities as we go into 2026.”
