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Futures up: Dow 0.26%, S&P 500 0.18%, Nasdaq 0.1%

Aug 22 (Reuters) - Future tied to Wall Street's main

stock indexes inched higher on Friday in the run-up to Federal

Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's speech at the Jackson Hole

Economic Symposium, which would shed more light on the

interest-rate path.

At the Wyoming research conference last year, Powell had

promised to lower rates and support the job market when the

unemployment rate started to rise, while in 2022 he underscored

the Fed's inflation-fighting rigor.

"Balancing the risks between a weakening labor market but

without commensurate easing in wage growth and inflation will

likely feature prominently in Powell's Jackson Hole speech

today," Geoff Yu, EMEA macro strategist at BNY said in a note.

His comments, expected at 10 a.m. ET, could play a pivotal

role in shaping the rate-cut expectations for September.

Traders now see a 71.3% chance of a 25-basis-point rate cut

next month, down from a 85.4% chance a week ago, according to

the CME FedWatch Tool.

Markets had initially ramped up the bets following a weak

payrolls report at the start of this month and after consumer

price data showed limited upward pressure from tariffs.

Other Fed officials speaking on Thursday appeared not so

keen on the idea of a rate cut next month.

Against this backdrop, all three main U.S. stock indexes are

set for weekly losses, with the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq

on pace for their worst weekly showing of the month.

The S&P 500 took its string of losses to a fifth straight

day on Thursday. A broad-based selloff in heavyweight technology

stocks has kept U.S. equities under pressure this week.

Information technology is the worst hit sub-sector

this week, while energy and real estate are on

track for mild weekly gains.

At 05:09 a.m. ET, Dow E-minis were up 118 points, or

0.26%, S&P 500 E-minis were up 11.75 points, or 0.18%

and Nasdaq 100 E-minis were up 22.25 points, or 0.1%.

Among early movers, Nvidia ( NVDA ) slipped 1.1% in

premarket trading after reports that the chipmaker has asked

Foxconn to suspend work on the H20 AI chip, the most

advanced product the company is permitted to sell to China.

Google-parent Alphabet gained 1.2% after reports

that the company has struck a six-year cloud computing deal with

Meta Platforms ( META ) worth more than $10 billion. Meta shares

were last up 0.2%.

Workday shed 4.4% after the human resources

software provider gave an in-line outlook for the current

quarter.