After Friday's rebound, U.S. equity markets are expected to slow their pace a little on Monday as they await comments from the Federal Reserve and the continuation of the earnings season.

Half an hour before the opening, futures on the main New York indices were up between 0.2% and 0.4%, pointing to a slightly higher start to the session.

Trading volumes are likely to remain thin, as investors refrain from taking large positions ahead of tomorrow's start of the Fed's monetary policy meeting.

While no major announcements are expected, markets are hoping that Fed Chairman Jerome Powell will be able to dispel some of the fog in which they have been operating for the past few weeks.

'Powell will take note of recent economic data (...) and will probably be reluctant to cut interest rates quickly', predict teams at Swiss asset manager J. Safra Sarasin. Safra Sarasin.

For the time being, the underlying trend should remain positive, still supported by the solid corporate earnings reported by Microsoft and Alphabet at the end of last week.

Wall Street finished in the green on Friday, and even signed its best week of the year in the wake, with a weekly gain of over 4% for the Nasdaq.

The next few days will be dominated by Amazon's and then Apple's quarterly performances, which will provide invaluable insight into the current shape of the tech giants.

Beyond the accounts as such, players will be just as attentive, if not more so, to the outlook outlined by each of these major groups.

Should the high-tech heavyweights present positive surprises, the Nasdaq could rally to new highs, given that the technology-weighted index is currently only 3% off its highs.

However, caution may prevail in the run-up to Friday's release of monthly US job creation figures.

A better-than-expected figure could prompt the Federal Reserve to postpone rate cuts, as traders are now only confidently anticipating a first round of monetary easing in November.

The market is expecting 250,000 new jobs after the 303,000 announced for March, a figure that would testify to the strength of the US economy.

No indicators are scheduled for Monday.

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