The economic calendar is full of noteworthy reports during the holiday-shortened week. In addition to Tuesday morning's speech from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, market participants will be keyed into Wednesday's release of the minutes from the June Fed meeting and Friday's jobs report, hoping both will provide clues on the central bank's rate-cutting timeline.
You can read on to see the entire weekly economic calendar of the most important upcoming economic reports scheduled to be released over the next several days. At times, we provide expanded previews and recaps for select reports.
Please check back often. This economic calendar is updated regularly. Bolded reports are those considered more noteworthy and all reporting times are in Eastern Standard Time.
Economic calendar highlights
Monday (7/1)
Tuesday (7/2)
Powell says "progress" has been made on inflation
When Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell speaks, markets listen. Following the May Fed meeting, for instance, stocks temporarily shot higher after the head of the central bank said more rate hikes were "unlikely."
That's why Tuesday's early morning speech from Powell is one of the most anticipated events on the economic calendar. Speaking during a central bank forum in Sintra, Portugal, Powell said that "quite a bit of progress" has been made to bring inflation down, but the Fed needs to see more data to make sure it's "moving sustainably down toward 2%" before rate cuts can happen.
"We're well aware that if we go too soon, that we can undo the good work we've done," Powell said. "If we do it too late, we could unnecessarily undermine the recovery and the expansion."
According to CME Group's FedWatch Tool, futures traders are currently pricing in a 63% chance the first quarter-point rate cut will occur in September, up from 47% one month ago.
Wednesday (7/3)
As a reminder, the stock market will close early on Wednesday, July 3, at 1 pm Eastern Time.
Thursday (7/4)
Thursday, July 4, is a stock market holiday, with both the equity and bond markets closed in observance of Independence Day. There are no noteworthy economic reports scheduled to be released.
Friday (7/5)
June jobs report closes out short week
The May jobs report blew past economists' expectations, with data showing the U.S. added 272,000 new jobs vs estimates for 180,000. This was also much higher than the 165,000 jobs added in April.
However, two data points help support calls for the Fed to start cutting rates sooner rather than later. One was a slight uptick in the unemployment rate (to 4.0% from 3.9%) and an unchanged reading in average hourly earnings growth (+4.1%).
This time around, Barclays economists expect the nonfarm payrolls report to show the U.S. added 200,000 jobs in June, easing back from May's monster gains. The group expects average hourly earnings to be up 3.9% year-over-year.
Reporting schedules are provided Forex Factory and MarketWatch.
