Wall Street is set to open lower on Wednesday, adding to the previous day's losses, ahead of much-anticipated statements from Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell later in the session.

Half an hour before the start of trading, futures contracts on New York indices were down by between 0.2% and 0.3%, heralding a slightly lower start to the session.

Observers are not expecting any spectacular announcements from the Fed Chairman at the Stanford University Economic Forum, to be held in the late afternoon.

However, the Fed chairman could provide the markets with further indications of his assessment of economic conditions and the institution's rate plans.

Last Friday, the Fed chairman insisted that "more confidence" was needed that inflation would soon return to the 2% target before rate cuts could begin.

The Fed Chairman on Friday thus came across as much more 'centrist', i.e. a little less accommodating, than in his press conference speech at the last Fed meeting", points out Alexandre Baradez, Head of Market Analysis at IG France.

Risk-taking is also likely to remain limited as we await the release of the ISM services index early in the session, which is expected to show that activity in the service sector continued to expand slightly in March.

Announced an hour before the opening, the fact that the US private sector generated 184,000 new jobs in March according to the ADP survey, a higher-than-expected figure, had little impact on the markets.

Investors are also keeping a close eye on the latest developments on the oil market, where US light crude (West Texas Intermediate, WTI) remains on an upward trend, at nearly $85.7 a barrel (+0.6%), as a result of the recent Israeli strikes against Iran.

At more than $2,300 an ounce, gold set new all-time highs, showing that investors are currently seeking to protect their portfolios in the face of current economic and geopolitical uncertainties.

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