Wall Street points higher to kick off holiday-shortened trading week

Wall Street is poised to kick off the holiday-shortened trading week with gains Monday after a bumpy ride last week.

Futures for the S&P 500 rose 0.5% before the bell, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average ticked up 0.2%. Nasdaq futures are up 0.7%.

This week, U.S. markets will be closed Thursday for the Thanksgiving holiday. A day later, it's on to the rush of Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

After last week's ups and downs over AI and Nvidia, traders will focus more on "the backbone of U.S. growth, the consumer, whose spending still drives two-thirds of GDP," Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a commentary.

Data on the U.S. economy was scarce during the 6-week U.S. government shutdown, leaving investors struggling to parse trends in the economy.

“This makes any sniff of holiday activity — foot traffic, discount depth, card authorizations — disproportionately important. In a data desert, even a puddle looks like a lake,” Innes said.

In early trading, Novo Nordisk shares tumbled 10% after the Danish drug maker reported that its Alzheimer's drug failed to slow progression of the disease in a trial.

In Europe at midday, Germany's DAX gained 0.5%, while Britain’s FTSE 100 rose 0.3%. The CAC 40 was unchanged.

Markets in Japan were closed for a holiday.

Hong Kong’s benchmark, the Hang Seng, rose 2% to 25,716.50. It got a boost from a 4.7% gain for e-commerce giant Alibaba, which has reported strong demand for its updated Qwen AI app. Alibaba is due to report earnings on Tuesday.

The Shanghai Composite index rose less than 0.1% to 3,836.77.

Australia's S&P/ASX 200 gained 1.3% to 8,525.10.

In South Korea, the Kospi reversed early gains, falling 0.2% to 3,846.06 on heavy selling of automakers.

Taiwan's Taiex added 0.3% and the Sensex in India shed 0.4%.

U.S. benchmark crude oil picked up 11 cents to $58.17 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, rose 12 cents to $62.06 a barrel.

On Friday, the S&P 500 gained 1% and the Dow climbed 1.1%. The Nasdaq composite rose 0.9%. Nearly 90% of stocks in the S&P 500 advanced.

It was a fitting finish for a week that left the S&P 500 just 4.2% below its record but also forced investors to stomach the sharpest hour-to-hour swings since a sell-off in April. The jarring moves are testing investors following a monthslong and remarkably smooth surge for stocks, and they come down to two basic as-yet unanswered questions.