07:44 AM EDT, 10/28/2024 (MT Newswires) -- US equity investors will focus on Big-Tech earnings this week while watching out for the jobs and inflation data amid concern the fiscally expansionary policies of presidential election candidates would likely force the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates higher for longer.

* The Nasdaq Composite closed at a new record last week following Tesla's (TSLA) quarterly results and ahead of earnings from five of the so-called seven Magnificent Seven companies -- Apple ( AAPL ) , Microsoft ( MSFT ) , Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL), Amazon.com ( AMZN ) , and Meta Platforms ( META ) next week.

* The Fed's preferred inflation reading -- personal consumption expenditures, or PCE -- will be refreshed on Thursday. It is "unlikely to shift the bias away" from a 25 basis-point cut on Nov. 7, with a "mild risk of a hold," a note from Scotiabank said late Friday.

* October's nonfarm payrolls, wage growth, and hours worked are due Friday. The JOLTS job openings data is due Tuesday.

* "My guesstimate is for payrolls to grow by only 95k with an uptick in the unemployment rate to 4.2%," the Scotiabank note said. "Hurricanes are likely to dominate favourable seasonal adjustment factors in temporarily depressing payroll growth before the rebound into year-end."

* Last week, the two-year US Treasury yield closed at 4.1%, up from 3.6% when the Fed cut rates in September as it outlined increased focus on the labor market rather than inflation. Over the comparable period, the 10-year yield jumped to 4.23% from 3.69% as bond vigilantes weighed the policy proposals from Democrats and Republicans. Early Monday, all Treasury yields traded higher ahead of the Nov. 5 presidential elections.

* "Ongoing labor market softening suggests monetary policy is restrictive at current levels and a Republican clean sweep -- resulting in greater inflationary pressures -- would simply push rate cuts further into the future rather than halting them altogether," Oxford Economics said on Friday.