Stock market today: Wall Street quiet ahead of inflation data; US tech giants dinged by EU

Trading on Wall Street is lethargic before the opening bell ahead of the government’s final inflation reports before next week’s Federal Reserve meeting, where it is widely expected that benchmark interest rates will be cut for the first time in more than four years.

Futures for the S&P 500 rose about 0.1% early Tuesday, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average are essentially flat.

Apple shares were off less than 1% after the European Union’s top court rejected the tech giant’s final legal challenge against an order from the bloc’s executive commission to repay 13 billion euros — more than $14 billion — in back taxes to Ireland.

The European Commission, the bloc’s executive branch, accused Apple of striking an illegal tax deal with Irish authorities so that it could pay extremely low rates. Apple denies such a deal took place.

Apple, which unveiled its latest iPhone model on Monday, wasn’t the only American tech company being punished by European regulators Tuesday. Google lost its final legal challenge against a European Union penalty for giving its own shopping recommendations an illegal advantage over rivals in search results. The decision ends the long-running antitrust case that comes with 2.4 billion euro ($2.7 billion) penalty.

Shares in Alphabet, Google’s parent company, rose less than 1% before markets opened.

Oracle shares jumped more than 8% after the business software company beat Wall Street’s first quarter sales and profit targets on the strength of its cloud services business.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise tumbled close to 5% after the information technology company said it would try to raise $1.35 billion in a stock offering to fund its pending acquisition of Juniper Networks.

Yet it is the latest monthly updates on inflation at the consumer and wholesale levels this week that are getting the most attention.

The Federal Reserve has been using high interest rates to pump the brakes on the economy in order to stifle inflation. It’s expected to start lowering rates later in September, which would ease the pressure on the economy, as it turns its focus toward protecting the job market and avoiding a recession.

Elsewhere, in Europe at midday, France’s CAC 40 inched up 0.2%, while Germany’s DAX and Britain’s FTSE 100 each fell 0.5%.

Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 fell 0.2% to finish at 36,159.16. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.3% to 8,011.90, while South Korea’s Kospi lost 0.5% to 2,523.43.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 0.2% to 17,234.09 after China’s customs office reported that China’s exports grew for a fifth consecutive month, in a sign of growing demand abroad.

Imports fell amid a slowing Chinese economy, growing just 0.5% compared to a year ago, falling short of the approximately 2% estimate by economists.

But exports in August expanded by 8.7% to $308.65 billion compared to the same period last year, according to data released Tuesday, beating economists’ estimates for about 6.5% growth.

The Shanghai Composite rose 0.3% to 2,744.19.

In energy trading, benchmark U.S. crude fell 97 cents to $67.74 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, lost 94 cents to $70.90 a barrel.

Natural gas regained some of its losses from a day earlier, when it tumbled 5% on fears that a potential hurricane barreling toward the Gulf Coast will crimp demand.

In currency trading, the U.S. dollar ticked down to 143.05 Japanese yen from 143.15 yen. The euro cost $1.1035, down slightly from $1.1040.

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