Hello friends and Fortune readers.
Wall Street stock futures are lower as the world absorbs the pessimism about the global economy implicit in the Federal Reserve’s decision to keep interest rates unchanged. The euro has risen to a four-week high of $1.1450 against the dollar, hitting European stocks badly. Commodities that are proxies for economic activity such as oil and copper have struggled to make gains.
Today’s must-read story is from Fortune‘s Stephen Gandel and it offers a thorough, number-crunching look at how much it would cost Uber to reclassify its drivers as employees, thus entitling them to a range of benefits and protections.
Here’s what you need to know today.
1. Stock market reacts to Fed
U.S. stocks were uneven to end the day on Thursday after the Federal Reserve announced its long-awaited decision on the timing of its eventual interest rate hike. The Fed opted not to raise rates for the first time since 2006 just yet. The decision led to a market rally, but stocks eventually tailed off and only the Nasdaq composite finished the day in the green while the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 both finished down slightly. Markets will look to rebound more on Friday to finish off what has been a week of gains for U.S. stocks, but are likely to struggle in view of the headwinds coming from other major markets across the globe.
2. Donald Trump chooses not to call out Obama slander
The man leading the race to become Republican candidate for the presidency in 2016 declined to correct a member of the audience at a Town Hall meeting in New Hampshire, when the latter claimed that President Barack Obama, a Hawaiian-born Christian, was in fact a Muslim and not American-born. Read more here.
3. Gauging economic activity
The Conference Board puts out its monthly look at future U.S. economic activity, with the corporate research group expected to show that its economic index gained 0.2% in August, indicating growth ahead, after dropping by that same amount the previous month.
4. Chinese housing recovery?
Data released today is expected to show that new-home prices were on the rise in 31 cities in China in July, according to Bloomberg. That’s a positive sign for China’s struggling economy and it suggests that the government’s decision to relax restrictions on home purchases and to cut interest rates is helping the country’s housing market build up steam.
5. Bernie Sanders visits Colbert
The Democratic challenger and liberal U.S. Senator from Vermont will be the latest presidential hopeful to hit the late-night television circuit tonight when Sanders visits Stephen Colbert on CBS’s (CBS) The Late Show. Aside from a huge debut last week, Colbert has so far lagged in the ratings behind NBC’s (CMCSA) Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show. But, Colbert seems to be working on carving out a niche as a highbrow host with a steady stream of guests from outside the traditional Hollywood circles, including politicians and corporate titans such as Apple (AAPL) CEO Tim Cook and Tesla Motors (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk.
— Reuters contributed to this report.
