Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, U.S., Aug. 24, 2026.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
Stock futures were near the flatline on Monday night following a losing session, though the major U.S. benchmarks still managed to post monthly advances.
Dow Jones Industrial Average futures advanced 11 points. S&P 500 futures were up less than 0.1%. Nasdaq-100 futures were flat.
The S&P 500 advanced 2.6% in August, while the Nasdaq Composite rose 3.9% in that time. The Dow climbed 1.3% for the month, its fifth straight monthly advance.
However, Wall Street ended the month on a sour note. The Dow dropped more than 370 points in regular trading, as oil prices climbed — pushing rates higher — following the U.S. striking two rocket launchers on Iran’s Larak Island. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite also fell on the day.
“Despite trading less than 115bps from ATHs going into today’s session, the market is exhibiting signs of nervousness across myriad of indicators,” traders at Goldman Sachs wrote, pointing to new American Association of Individual Investors Sentiment Survey data. “This attitude toward risk is not just theoretical, investors are quite literally putting their money where their mouth is in terms of portfolio risk allocations.”
On top of that, September has been a historically bad month for stocks.
Those seasonal factors along with a jam-packed economic calendar are likely to keep investors on their toes the rest of the week. Manufacturing and services sector data are due Tuesday and Wednesday.
On Friday, investors will receive the August jobs report. Economists polled by Dow Jones expect 53,000 jobs were added for the month.
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