The Morning Report, 2-19-205

Get ready for an exciting day in the markets! U.S. stock index futures held steady on Wednesday as investors eagerly digested President Donald Trump's latest tariff announcements and awaited the much-anticipated release of the Federal Reserve's January meeting minutes later today.

On Tuesday, President Trump made waves by revealing plans to impose auto tariffs "around 25%" along with similar duties on semiconductor and pharmaceutical imports.

The spotlight is on the upcoming minutes from the U.S. central bank's January policy meeting—where members decided to keep interest rates steady. Fed Chair Jerome Powell signaled that rate cuts would only come if inflation and employment data warranted it, and these minutes are set to drop at 2 p.m. ET.

Investors are on the edge of their seats, looking for clues on the Fed's interest rate path, especially after last week's mixed consumer and producer price data and a notable drop in retail sales, which led to a dip in Treasury yields.

"Keep an eye out for more discussions on the impact of Trump's policies and any hints of changes in members' views on the timing of future rate cuts compared to December forecasts," noted Karl Steiner, head of analysis at SEB, in an exciting update.

Traders are buzzing with anticipation, expecting at least one 25-basis-point rate cut, with over a 43% chance of another cut by December, according to LSEG data.

In just four weeks since taking office, Trump has already slapped a 10% tariff on all Chinese imports, in addition to existing tariffs, and announced, then delayed for a month, 25% tariffs on goods from Mexico and non-energy imports from Canada.

The S&P 500 reached an all-time closing high in the previous session, giving a boost to tech titans like Microsoft (MSFT) and Nvidia (NVDA).

As of 04:53 a.m. ET, Dow E-minis were up 36 points, or 0.08%, S&P 500 E-minis increased by 3.5 points, or 0.06%, and Nasdaq 100 E-minis rose 17 points, or 0.08%.

All eyes are on retail giant Walmart's (WMT) earnings, a key indicator of the American consumer's health, expected later this week.

Before the market opens, we’re looking forward to results from contract research firm Charles River Laboratories (CRL) and chipmaker Analog Devices (ADI).

Arista Networks (ANET) took a 3.8% dip despite the cloud computing provider forecasting first-quarter revenue above Wall Street expectations.

Bumble took a 15.7% hit following the dating app operator's forecast of first-quarter revenue below analysts' expectations.

Celanese saw a 13.1% drop after the specialty chemicals company reported a quarterly loss.