Futures are flat-to-firm on Monday, digesting Friday's give-back from record highs into a week that's data-light but event-heavy.
The S&P cleared 7,800 for the first time last week before Friday's pullback on a soft July retail sales print and creeping yields. Monday's premarket is split: Nasdaq 100 futures lead, up roughly 0.3-0.5% as Anthropic's blowout revenue outlook reignites the AI-capex trade and lifts Micron and Sandisk, while Dow and Russell futures sag. The 10-year sits near 4.70%, the dollar is at a three-month low, and VIX around 15 is up on the day but still historically compressed — consistent with dealers still long gamma near the highs, a setup that buys dips and caps rips until something breaks the range.
Empire State manufacturing prints at 8:30 but the real event is Wednesday's July FOMC minutes, sandwiched between a retail-earnings gauntlet — Home Depot Tuesday, Target and Lowe's Wednesday, Walmart Thursday — that will stress-test the consumer read after Friday's miss. All of it is a lead-in to Jackson Hole on August 27-29, Fed Chair Warsh's first keynote, where the September path gets set. Priced in: a steady-to-cut base case with hike odds fading; the market is not braced for a hawkish surprise.
The risk: geopolitics and rates moving together. Israel-Hezbollah escalation and Strait of Hormuz posturing have Brent pressing $90; a further spike paired with a yield break above 4.75-4.80% would puncture the low-vol regime and force gamma to flip lower through the SPY/QQQ pivots.