Wall Street Set For Early Rebound Following Yellen Speech - U.S. Commentary

(RTTNews) - U.S. equities look poised for a rebound at the start of Friday's session. Investors are ready to dip back into the market after three days of losses. Interest rates remain the main topic of conversation following remarks by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen on Thursday night.

Going into Friday's action, Wall Street has seen three consecutive days of declines amid lingering uncertainty about interest rates.

On Thursday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 78.57 points, or 0.5 percent, to close at 16,201.32, after plunging more than 250 points earlier in the session. The S&P fell 6.53 points, or 0.3 percent, to close at 1,932.23. The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 18.27 points, or 0.4 percent, to finish at 4,734.48.

Investors remain keyed into the Fed as Friday's open draws near. Fed chief Janet Yellen made remarks on Thursday night, saying the Fed remains on track to raise interest rates by year's end.

Specifically, Yellen said the more "prudent strategy is to begin tightening in a timely fashion and at a gradual pace."

"If the FOMC were to delay the start of the policy normalization process for too long, we would likely end up having to tighten policy relatively abruptly to keep the economy from significantly overshooting its goals," Yellen said in prepared remarks at the University of Massachusetts.

The remarks came a week after the Fed left interest rates near zero yet again. The move left investors confused about when the long-anticipated interest rate hike - the first in nearly a decade - was likely to happen.

In economic news, growth in the U.S. economy was revised higher for the April-to-June period.

Updated government data showed that the U.S. Gross Domestic Product expanded at a revised rate of 3.9 percent in the second quarter. This was revised up from the 3.7 percent growth that was reported last month.

Turning to corporate news, Apple, Inc. (AAPL) is set to blow past its record for first-weekend sales for the latest iPhones series. iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus versions are scheduled to go one sale Friday.

Meanwhile, Bed Bath & Beyond Inc (BBBY) reported a decline in second-quarter profit as expenses continued to weigh on earnings, even as sales inched up. The home goods retailer's earnings were in line with Wall Street estimates while sales missed expectations by a tad.

Looking overseas, Asian stocks ended mixed on Friday as lackluster cues from Wall Street overnight and the comments by Janet Yellen kept investors' risk appetite in check heading into the weekend.

China's Shanghai Composite index dropped 50.34 points or 1.60 percent to 3,092.35 in low-volume trading. Japan's benchmark Nikkei average rose 308.68 points or 1.76 percent to 17,880.51, recouping a large chunk of Thursday's nearly 3 percent loss on speculation the Bank of Japan will loosen its monetary policy at the October policy meeting to support a fragile economic recovery.

The European markets are rebounding from Thursday's selloff.