Stock futures are slightly higher ahead of Friday’s session

Stock futures inched higher early on Friday after the Dow Industrial Average and S&P 500 closed near flat following a short-lived rally on the back of another positive inflation report.

Futures tied to the Dow Jones added 45 points, or 0.14%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures rose 0.17% and 0.25%, respectively.

Shares of Rivian seesawed in overnight trading after the electric vehicle maker beat top- and bottom-line estimates but trimmed its full-year guidance. Poshmark, Olo and Illumina shares traded lower after posting earnings results.

Thursday’s postmarket moves followed a bewildering regular trading session that saw the major averages close flat or slightly lower after rallying earlier in the day following a better-than-expected producer price index report for July.

The Nasdaq Composite dipped 0.58% to close at 12,779.91, while the Dow added 27.16 points, or 0.08%, to finish at 33,336.67 and the S&P closed 0.07% lower at 4,207.27.

Six of the 11 S&P 500 sectors finished the session lower, led by healthcare, which tumbled 0.71%. Energy closed up more than 3% on the back of higher crude and natgas prices, helping to unravel the peak inflation narrative. Shares of Disney also rallied nearly 5% after reporting strong subscriber numbers and topping estimates in the latest quarter.

“I think there’s profit taking today,” said Sanctuary Wealth chief investment officer Jeff Kilburg. ”...We didn’t really have a pullback or didn’t erase any of the gains off of CPI [Wednesday], but we just kind of had a bit of a volume discovery and a price discovery after this surprising one-two punch,” of better-than-expected CPI and PPI data.

On the economic front, import prices and consumer sentiment data are due out Friday.