Futures struggle for direction ahead of Fed meeting

(Reuters) - U.S. banal scale futures struggled for absorption connected Tuesday up of the Federal Reserve's upcoming gathering that volition beryllium intimately monitored for commentary from the cardinal slope connected the imaginable economical ramifications of ongoing tariff disputes.

The cardinal bank's two-day rate-setting gathering starts aboriginal successful the day, and is acceptable to reason connected Wednesday. Markets expect it volition support the presumption quo connected involvement rates, according to information compiled by LSEG.

The Fed's updated economical projections volition shed airy connected policymakers' assessments of the Trump administration's argumentation maneuvers.

"The changes that we bash expect (from the cardinal bank) are successful a pessimistic direction," said Ryan Wang, U.S. economist astatine HSBC.

"The imaginable 'stagflationary' risks from tariffs and commercialized argumentation uncertainty make a complication for the monetary argumentation outlook".

President Donald Trump's tariffs person ignited a commercialized skirmish with cardinal U.S. trading partners, including swift retaliatory tariffs.

Analysts noted U.S. equities entered oversold territory past week.

At 05:47 a.m. ET, U.S. S&P 500 E-minis were down 3.5 points, oregon 0.06%, Nasdaq 100 E-minis were down 39.75 points, oregon 0.2%, Dow E-minis were down 4 points, oregon 0.01%.

The S&P 500 plunged much than 10% from its February high, confirming the bellwether scale has been successful a correction since then.

The blue-chip Dow scale hovered astir 3% shy of a correction, portion the tech-heavy Nasdaq confirmed it is successful a correction connected March 6.

Gold, often traded arsenic a safe-haven asset, crossed $3,000 per ounce for the archetypal clip past week, and deed yet different grounds precocious earlier successful the session.

U.S.-listed stocks of golden miners specified arsenic Barrick Gold roseate 1.8% and Gold Fields gained 2.7% successful premarket trading.

Some investors engaged successful "dip buying," capitalizing connected discounted U.S. equities, and that has propelled each the 3 large indexes up much than 2% each implicit the past 2 sessions.

Focus volition besides beryllium connected developments related to the Ukraine-Russia warfare arsenic Trump was scheduled to talk to Russian President Vladimir Putin aboriginal successful the day.

(Reporting by Pranav Kashyap successful Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta)