As investors assess new remarks from Fed Chairman Jerome Powell ahead of the announcement of the most recent weekly jobless claims, U.S. markets are expected to open mostly down on Thursday.

The Dow futures contract was unchanged at 07:00 ET (12:00 GMT), while the S&P 500 futures were down 7 points, or 0.2%, and the Nasdaq 100 futures were down 55 points, or 0.4%.

On Wednesday, the second day of his semi-annual testimony, Powell returned to Capitol Hill and reiterated to the House Financial Services Committee his position that the Federal Reserve was ready to accelerate rate hikes if the facts warranted the action.

Citigroup has increased its projection for the U.S. central bank’s benchmark lending rate increase to 50 basis points from 25 basis points at the meeting in March. The firm also increased its forecast for peak rates to a range of 5.5% to 5.75%.

Powell claimed that recent inflation and employment data, particularly the monumental jobs report from early February, were greater than the policymakers had anticipated.

The release of weekly initial jobless claims later in the day and then Friday’s official employment report will be in the limelight as this week’s private payroll and job opening statistics already came out higher than anticipated.

Analysts expect the economy added 205,000 jobs last month but are also waiting to see if January’s red-hot 517,000 number will be revised.

In business-related news, Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com’s (NASDAQ:JD) fourth-quarter revenue slightly below forecasts on Thursday due to COVID lockdowns that were in effect at the time.

Moreover, companies like retailer BJs Wholesale Club, computer software provider Oracle (NYSE:ORCL), and retailer of cosmetics and beauty products Ulta Beauty (NASDAQ:ULTA) are likely to report quarterly earnings (NYSE:BJ).

After recent losses, oil prices saw modest increases on Thursday as concerns about the expansion of petroleum demand this year were heightened by poor Chinese economic statistics and the likelihood for additional U.S. interest rate hikes.

According to data released on Thursday, factory gate prices in China declined more than anticipated in February, indicating that the world’s largest crude importer’s manufacturing sector was operating at significantly less than capacity.

The Energy Information Administration officially reported on Wednesday that U.S. oil stockpiles decreased by 1.7 million barrels last week, the first decline in 10 weeks.

By 7:00 ET, Brent futures were up 0.2% to $82.81 and U.S. oil futures were trading 0.1% higher at $76.74 per barrel. Thus far this week, both benchmarks have decreased by almost 4%.

Gold futures also increased 0.2% to $1,822.80/oz, and the EUR/USD traded 0.3% higher at 1.0575.