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WALL STREET DIPS AS CAUTION REIGNS AHEAD OF FED'S POWELL'S SPEECH

Shares on Wall Street are slipping early Thursday, as investors are turning cautious ahead of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's speech in Jackson Hole. The big debate is how Powell will frame the Fed's monetary policy stance before the September policy meeting.

Some market participants believe that he will strike a dovish tone in his remarks and set the stage for an interest rate cut next month. Others, on the other hand, suggest that he could stick to his patient stance given the spike in recent producer prices data and a still elevated consumer price numbers.

Meanwhile, the highly-anticipated quarterly results from big-box retailer Walmart did little to boost sentiment. Walmart WMT.N raised its fiscal year sales and profit, driven by strong demand from shoppers across all income levels. But its shares are down 4.3%.

Nasdaq remains down, sliding for a third straight session. Market participants attributed the selloff to a range of factors including a technical pullback after driving much of the stock market's recovery in the weeks after the April 2nd "Liberation Day."

Worries about AI and its future were also cited for Nasdaq's tumble.

"This time it (Nasdaq's slide) is not about reciprocal tariffs but simply buyer exhaustion and some second-guessing on whether the hype has been overdone in the latest leg of the AI rally," writes Dave Rosenberg, founder and president of Rosenberg Research.

"The rotation into the unloved sectors like Health Care, Staples, and even Energy is continuing — but not enough to prevent the S&P 500 from experiencing a similar stretch of losses."

Here's an early snapshot of financial markets:

(Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss)

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